Writer/director Richard Linklater’s A
Scanner Darkly is a challenging and
visually-stunning Philip K. Dick adaptation
that, in all of its profundity, goes absolutely
nowhere. Usually, I will complain that a movie
tries to mold too much of a story around too few
ideas, but here, Linklater has it the other way
around. The film, much thanks to its source
material, is full of riveting ideas which are as
resonant in today’s society as they were when
Dick originally wrote his novel in 1977, but on
the level of a linear-narrative, it offers
almost nothing for viewers to chew on. The
premise involves undercover agent Bob Arctor
(Keanu Reeves) in a future that has fallen
victim to loose drug-enforcement laws. The
popular “Substance D”, among other more-typical
drugs, overwhelms sects of the U.S. population.
Unfortunately, Linklater’s adapted screenplay is
only able to use this fascinating set-up to
question the progression of order in American
Society; his nonchalant re-creation of A
Scanner Darkly’s story is mostly muddled and
uninteresting.
What’s much more engaging than the film’s
story is its visual appearance. Linklater
presents A Scanner Darkly in the style of
rotoscope-animation, filming every scene as one
would a live-action feature, but then painting
over the frames and adding additional effects in
order to create a surreal look about the images.
The writer/director also used the technique in
his previous film, Waking Life, but here
he has refined it for a highly haunting effect.
Primarily, Linklater has renovated the style by
implementing more realistic-looking backgrounds
than those featured in Waking Life, which
accentuate the animated features of the
human-figures. Not to mention, in addition to
its ability to highlight Dick’s paranoid vision
throughout the film’s duration, rotoscoping was
highly cost-effective in allowing Linklater to
craft certain special-effects. It’s quite a
shame that the weak narrative isn’t able to
support A Scanner Darkly’s commanding,
illustrious visions.
Among the many other things that A
Scanner Darkly has going for it, the
performances in the film are superb. Had the
storyline matched the intellectual complexity of
the movie’s thematic value, Reeves’
interpretation of the protagonist’s dilemma
involving his government work’s intrusion on his
personal-life would have been highly compelling.
Robert Downey Jr., Rory Cochrane, and Woody
Harrelson also chime in with tremendous
portrayals of users of Substance D; their
frantic exhibitions of addiction make for the
most complete thread of the movie’s story.
Due to his Linklater’s outstanding
repertoire, A Scanner Darkly’s lackluster
narrative hasn’t caused me to lose faith in the
filmmaker as a writer, but it certainly hasn’t
improved my view of his career, either. I’m glad
that Dick’s pertinent body of work continues to
be adapted by Hollywood today, but it’s
unfortunate that the results, in this case, are
dizzy and incomplete.
-Danny, Bucket Reviews (7.18.2006)