Brian De Palma is perhaps the least famous (if not skilled) of that renowned group of upstart directors that bucked the studio system in the seventies before sliding comfortably into it in the eighties – his contemporaries including Spielberg, Coppola, Lucas and Scorcese.
He often displays brilliant technique, and is a the master of the continuing single long-take tracking shock perhaps even more so than Scorcese. It's nevertheless been argued that he's such a fan of Hitchcock that he's never found his own unique style (or in more direct terms he a blatant plagarist). Like Hitchcock, he seems to prefer flicks with a heavy emphasis of voyeurism, duplicity, and sadism, and yet unlike the Hitch-meister, his better movies are the ones in which his script input is minimalised and/or he is reined in by strong producers.
He has made one truly superb film (“The Untouchables”), a few great ones (like “Mission Impossible”, “Scarface”, “Casualties of War”), and a lot of stuff that simply pass the time to varying degrees of interest.
“The Black Dahlia” falls into the latter category.
The film is based on James Ellroy’s pulp noirish novel, which itself was very loosely based on true story of a police hunt for the vicious murderer of a forties
The tangled “whodunit?” of a plot gets lost along the route of De Palma’s expressionistic homages to and flourishes of forties noir cinema – the likes of “Double Indemnity” and “The Postman Always Rings Twice”, with a fair shot of early Hitchcock splashed in for good measure.
The best scene in “The Black Dahlia” however rips off not noir cinema, but De Palma’s own peak of direction – the staircase scene in “The Untouchables”. This time though the sequence is nowhere near as sustained – or restrained – but the staircase murder/confrontation scene in Dahlia is one of the film’s rare moments in which the excitement level of the audience rises out of the “waz-goin-on?” stupor that De Palma has lulled them into.
The movie is more about mood and moments than cohesive story, which is always a shame in a mystery thriller, and perhaps why I felt a little bedazzled by the excess of the former and the lack of the latter.
Nevertheless, the visuals are interesting, the production design is excellent, and De Palma’s signature-creepy touches are amusing. It often skirts dangerously close to high camp – and crosses it a few times, especially in the portrayals of Hilary Swank’s classic (yet mannish) femme fatale, and Fiona Shaw’s wacky society madam.
Josh Harnett – previously a bland, handsome, wooden lead – is actually maturing as an actor into someone more watchable and sympathetic. He’s still a little bland and vacant here, but it suits his protagonist character, a young cop lost at sea in the bizarre noir web.
His performance is upped in his scenes with his more confident, arrogant partner (and boxing opponent) played by the underrated Aaron Eckhart, a great actor when stretched by good material.
These cop buddies share a love triangle with a fairly empty character played by Scarlett Johanssen, whose stunning lips and curves wonderfully fill out the noir femme role, but who actually comes off as MORE blank and wasted than Harnett – not her fault really, considering her character is one note and barely essential to the plot.
The cast is fine overall, but often struggle with material that has been regurgitated from stuff over sixty years old. It’s interesting to watch De Palma rework noir like this, but ultimately, preferable to go and rent a Billy Wilder or Hitchcock DVD from the classic section of Blockbuster.
