Screening of "The Singing Detective" Museum of the Moving Image, Queens NY October 8th, 2003 This was one very strange movie. How do you describe a movie when the people who made the movie can't easily describe it? Anyway, here goes: Robert Downey Jr plays Dan Dark, a writer of bad detective novels who is languishing in a hospital with some awful skin condition. He is a miserable SOB, and you get the impression that his terrible skin disease just made a bad person worse. As he lays in his hospital bed, he has hallucinations of characters from his book, "The Singing Detective", in classic 50's film-noir style. We also see into the dreams of his childhood which will shape him into the man he has become. The film moves between these 3 "worlds", with characters taking on different roles in his various states. For example, Robin Wright Penn is his kindly wife in the "real world," and, well, a slutty moll in the noir world. Carla Guigino plays his messed-up mother, and Katie his kindly nurse. It seems like Katie is the only female in the movie that doesn't repulse him somehow (he's not totally crazy lol), and as the movie develops we see why he holds such feelings. Some of the best scenes in the movie (ok...other than when Katie "lubes" her patient) are the conversations between Downey and an unrecognizable Mel Gibson, who plays the psychiatrist assigned to help Dark deal with his many problems. I was mostly enjoying the ride that this movie was taking me on...switching realities in a way that moved the story along, yet kept you baffled..but in a good way. But then after a while, it began to get somewhat tedious. Roger Ebert described his experience viewing the first Lord of the Rings movie this way: The film is remarkably well made. But it does go on, and on, and on--more vistas, more forests, more sounds in the night, more fearsome creatures, more prophecies, more visions, more dire warnings, more close calls, until we realize this sort of thing can continue indefinitely. That's kinda how I felt watching "The Singing Detective". It was interesting to look at. The actors were all excellent in their roles. It just seemed like after a while, they didn't know how to end it, so they kept going. And going. So how do you rate a movie that you smiled alot during, laughed at a couple of times, enjoyed a lot of, but with twenty minutes left you were looking at your watch wondering when it was going to end? I guess you'd have to call it disappointing, but at the same time you respected the talents of those who worked on the movie. Chaz's Rating: 2 1/2 stars out of 4 ==================== Notes: -I haven't seen the BBC miniseries, so I can't compare the projects, sorry. :( -What is Katie's screen time in the movie? Hmm..I'd have to compare it to Wonder Boys..maybe a lil less even. She's not onscreen for a very long period of time. But she does appear in what, I think, is the film's funniest moment. -Is Katie naked in the movie? No sorry...go back to watching your DVD of "The Gift" fella. ;) -I don't know how the hell they are going to market this sucker. I wish them luck though. Even though I didn't love it, I respect their attempt to make a movie like this, and would hate to see future risky projects not be made because this doesn't make it big at the box office.

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