by DIANA SLAMPYAK

Director: Richard Linklater Based on
the Novel by Philip K. Dick
Starring: Keanu Reeves, Robert Downey, Jr., Woody Harrelson, Winona Ryder and Rory Cochrane
Rated: R
Running Time: 110 minutes
NHA Review Rating: 3/10 Chopsticks

Watching a man go psychotic should be somewhat captivating. Instead, watching A Scanner Darkly was one hundred and ten of the most tedious minutes I have spent in a theatre in a long time. I love films about drugs and the drug culture but this one just didn't do it for me. Maybe it was the format the interpolated rotoscoping that drove me nuts. Maybe it was a lackluster screenplay based on an extremely dull graphic novel that for some reason is extremely popular. Perhaps it was the pacing. Perhaps it was the sci-fi elements.

Whatever it was: it was dreary watching
A Scanner Darkly.

It is seven years into the future. The war on drugs has become as volatile as the present day war on terror. Undercover cop Bob Arctor (Reeves) reluctantly follows orders to start spying on his friends. Aforementioned friends include: Jim Barris (Downey, Jr.), a babbling freak who prattles endlessly about spies and wanting to shoot people; Ernie Luckman (Harrelson), your usual stoner dude; Donna Hawthorne (Ryder), who turns out to be more than you initially expect; and Charles Freck (Cochrane), a substance D addict. When Arctor is instructed to step up the surveillance on himself, his alternate self comes to light and he is launched into a world of paranoia and absurdity, where it's tough to know who your friends are. And it's hard for the audience to follow, too.

The film plays like a graphic novel come to life with live-action photography overlaid onto an animation process the rotoscoping I spoke of earlier with which Linklater first utilized in Waking Life. This style is visually disturbing with the swaying and swirling of overlaid colors. It is also a gimmick that wears thin pretty quickly.

The pacing is off, too. The movie is intended to be a thriller, but there is nothing really thrilling about it. Linklater isn't at his best here. And he's done some good work the Before Sunrise and Before Sunset series, Dazed and Confused, for example. But this one is utterly forgettable.