Pi in the Sky

A Scanner Darkly

Posted on July 3rd, 2007 at 11:29am by Pi.
Categories: Cinema.

A Scanner Darkly
Animation, Science-Fiction, Drama, Thriller. USA, 2006
Director: Richard Linklater
Writers: Philip K. Dick (original novel), Richard Linklater (screenplay)
Cast: Keanu Reeves, Winona Ryder, Robert Downey Jr., Woody Harrelson

A very interesting mixture of drama and thriller, based in Dick’s own experience with drugs, but situated in a near future. An undercover cop deals with the addiction provoked by the drug he fights against. It features an awesome and unique visual style because the movie has been rotoscoped entirely.

As I explained in my review of The Lord Of The Rings (1978), rostoscoping is a technique where a scene or the whole movie is first filmed in live action, and then animation is drawn over it. For A Scanner Darkly, a new method for rotoscoping, using special software which does vector-based interpolated rotoscoping, has been used. It gives the movie a very unique look, although admittedly also strange.

Beyond the visuals, the movie is quite faithful to Dick’s novel. Although it has some understandable changes, it respects the original sources. Moreover, it shows a distinct paranoid and schizoid seal, common to many works by Dick, like no other movie based on his works (even Blade Runner).

Besides being very critical with drugs consumption and abuse, it’s also a quite strong metaphor of the drug contradictory paradigm in our society, with several noteworthy paralellisms with other movies like Traffic. The mixture of police thriller, personal drama, and near future science fiction is very pleasant, and the story is very good. Not a pleasant story, but well done.

My score: 7/10. Worth watching, with quality, and very interesting.

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