Outstanding sci-fi film noir

Rating: 8/10 (23 March 2013)

THE CROW director Alex Proyas followed up his stylish debut with this even more stylish slice of sci-fi film noir. It's a complex yet eminently watchable beast, featuring a twisted, world-changing plot and using all manner of innovative ideas to create a true work of science fiction. Where THE MATRIX took a sci-fi principle and used it as a basis for a straightforward action flick, DARK CITY remains about the ideas and their implications all the way through.
The film kicks off as a straightforward murder mystery, featuring the ever underrated Rufus Sewell (in a rare Hollywood good guy role) as a wronged man on the run from the authorities. So far so Hitchcock, but throw in a dogged cop (William Hurt, who's never been better) and a series of repugnant baldies led by the camp but excellent Richard O'Brien, and you have the recipe for one uniquely thrilling film.
There are missteps along the way, including the infamously bad judgement of the studio to include an opening narration which makes redundant all the genuine twists and surprises later on in the story, but for the most part this is an exhilarating slice of film-making and much more mature than the better known Keanu Reeves-starrer. Proyas elicits some fascinating performances from his assembled cast, including an alluring debut for Aussie starlet Melissa George, a creepy turn for British character actor Ian Richardson, a bug-eyed role for MAD MAX 2's Bruce Spence, Jennifer Connelly as a paragon of virtue and the surprisingly excellent Kiefer Sutherland, cast against type as a twitchy doctor whose role owes much to Peter Lorre. The special effects involving the buildings are superb and the film as a whole is a refreshingly original piece of sci-fi done on a grand scale.