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A rather different movie here. Dark City is a bit of an ambitious one in terms of originality, and it generally succeeds with such even if I wouldn't have made certain writing decisions, personally. I know that there have been some comparisons with this movie to The Matrix, but they only hold up on the most surface of levels. The two movies have very different goals. I will say though that I believe The Matrix to be just generally better written and executed compared to this movie, even if the two completely differ in their goals.
Even with this movie's problems though, I'm not going to take more than a star away from it because it feels like an original work and there's a lot of genius within it. It's worth at least one watch for sure.
One of the very first things that stood out to me when I watched this movie is how the actors are playing their parts. At first, I thought it was just bad acting from one or two actors, but then I started to see such acting from more and more of the actors in the movie, and then I realized, this isn't bad acting at all. Far from it. This is, in actuality, absolutely perfect acting to depict individuals who've had their identities and memories erased and swapped out again and again and again. They're acting feels inauthentic because the identities and memories of the characters are inauthentic and hang off them like poorly fitted clothes. They wear the memories but the memories are not theirs. It is not who they are. Amazingly implemented detail there, and hats off to the directors, writers, and actors for that. There's also lots of hints to indicate that John Murdoch isn't really who his memories say he is and isn't a killer.
I also really liked in the writing how the characters seemed to take such memories for granted. Of COURSE they know where Shell Beach is. It's... Over there... Maybe? But there's nothing there whatsoever, is there. Of COURSE there's daylight. They just... Haven't seen it for the past... Week... ? Two weeks... ? Now, this does invite a sticky question. It's clear in the movie that the inhabitants of the city don't feel compelled to not think about these things. So why aren't there more people questioning this? There's possible explanations to this though, so I'm willing to hand-wave it. And besides, it's shown that there are actually outliers like that but are usually taken care of somehow.
But unfortunately, that's not the end of this movie's flaws. For one, there's a big plot hole having to do with the motivations of the Strangers. Specifically, why do they care about wanting to find out what makes humans what they are? The movie says that their species is dying out, but with their miraculous ability to "tune", it would seem to me that the solution to their problems is already in their hands. For what do they need humans for exactly? Why don't they just make more of their species? Putting that aside, there's also the lesser issue of John simply not using the power he has properly. He finds out pretty early that he has SOME kind of power. Why doesn't he ever work to expand and get control of that power?
At the end though, even with the training implanted into him by the good doctor, I don't know if it's really believable that he can just foil the Strangers at their own game here. They've been tuning stuff for years and years. Even if John had those years of training, he's just one human against a horde of Strangers. The math doesn't add up.
And finally, I have a minor gripe against how the Strangers look. The all-male shaved-head-and-black-leather brigade just looks a little too cheesy for me. It doesn't quite fit the identity of these aliens and it looks ugly to boot on top of that.
I also really liked in the writing how the characters seemed to take such memories for granted. Of COURSE they know where Shell Beach is. It's... Over there... Maybe? But there's nothing there whatsoever, is there. Of COURSE there's daylight. They just... Haven't seen it for the past... Week... ? Two weeks... ? Now, this does invite a sticky question. It's clear in the movie that the inhabitants of the city don't feel compelled to not think about these things. So why aren't there more people questioning this? There's possible explanations to this though, so I'm willing to hand-wave it. And besides, it's shown that there are actually outliers like that but are usually taken care of somehow.
But unfortunately, that's not the end of this movie's flaws. For one, there's a big plot hole having to do with the motivations of the Strangers. Specifically, why do they care about wanting to find out what makes humans what they are? The movie says that their species is dying out, but with their miraculous ability to "tune", it would seem to me that the solution to their problems is already in their hands. For what do they need humans for exactly? Why don't they just make more of their species? Putting that aside, there's also the lesser issue of John simply not using the power he has properly. He finds out pretty early that he has SOME kind of power. Why doesn't he ever work to expand and get control of that power?
At the end though, even with the training implanted into him by the good doctor, I don't know if it's really believable that he can just foil the Strangers at their own game here. They've been tuning stuff for years and years. Even if John had those years of training, he's just one human against a horde of Strangers. The math doesn't add up.
And finally, I have a minor gripe against how the Strangers look. The all-male shaved-head-and-black-leather brigade just looks a little too cheesy for me. It doesn't quite fit the identity of these aliens and it looks ugly to boot on top of that.
Even with this movie's problems though, I'm not going to take more than a star away from it because it feels like an original work and there's a lot of genius within it. It's worth at least one watch for sure.
