Dark City
Inspector Frank Bumstead: So Husselbeck, what kind of killer do you think stops to save a dying fish?
I've always enjoyed watching this film ever since I first witnessed it in the movie theater when it came a couple years after
The Crow using a similar shadowed world; this time in a noir setting that could, or could not, be somewhere in the forties. Though purposely keeping it vague, considering the ever changing landscape of this night time city and it's denizens who continually walk the circular maze that is their existence.
Until John Murdoch "wakes up" and begins to see what is hidden behind the curtain of their lives.
Starring Rufus Sewell (whom I do enjoy when he plays the villain in other films) who must figure out, not only, who he is, but what is truly occurring as the very buildings change just as much as the citizens do. And The Strangers that orchestrate it. The best of them, Mr. Hand is played by Richard O'Brien the creator of Rocky Horror as well as my favorite character from that film, Riff-Raff.
Along with Sewell's Murdoch is Det. Bumstead (John Hurt) who finds out that it isn't simply a serial killer he's been assigned to find, but, why no one has memories of day time or of anything remotely recent.
The truth of it all is known by Keifer Sutherland's Dr. Schrieber, who seems to channel Peter Lorre as the nervous doctor The Strangers force to aid them in their experiments.
Finally, we have a beautiful Jennifer Connolly who I just sigh with delight during her opening scene, singing "Sway" with a Veronica Lake hair style.
With a crazy mix of noir and science fiction with a story line that comes from a Twilight Zone episode and a camera style that follows the illustrations of many great graphic novels; I have, and continue to enjoy this heavily shadowed cosmos.