Wow, I'm Really in the Minority Here

Rating: 4/10 (17 September 2005)

I've read reviews of "Dark City" in many places (and many of them here) hailing it as a modern science fiction masterpiece, so boy was I disappointed when I watched it and came to the sober conclusion that it's just not very good. Yeah, yeah, yeah the visuals are stunning, blah, blah, blah, but as is proved time and again, visuals alone can't make a movie. At least this had an interesting story, but as befalls so many films in this mind-bending sci-fi genre (and "The Matrix" suffers from this as well, though it's a far better movie), the writers have set up such a cerebral concept that the movie grinds to a halt when it has to trudge through all the exposition just so that the audience can keep track of what's going on. Though that in itself is never very clear in "Dark City." This movie just rushes from one scene to the next, in an attempt to create a breathless and exciting tone I guess, but scenes aren't allowed to play themselves out. We're on to the next set piece before we've had time to absorb the one we just saw, and the characters get buried underneath all the furious editing. However, I don't believe there would be much chance for them anyway, since most of the actors aren't very good either. Rufus Sewell and William Hurt do o.k. but Jennifer Connelly phones in a wan performance and Kiefer Sutherland is barely watchable in a lamentable impersonation of the creepy Nazi chasing Indiana Jones in "Raiders of the Lost Ark." His line delivery is so eccentric and monotonous that I was cringing every time he opened his mouth by the film's end.
No, I'm afraid the majority is out to sea with this one. This film and "masterpiece" don't belong in the same sentence.
Grade: C-