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The Black Dahlia
Feb. 20th, 2007 08:39 pmI watched The Black Dahlia on pay-per-view last night. (Digital cable is a wonderful thing.)
Hilary Swank, playing the femme fatale, seemed to have spent a weekend closeted up with old Katherine Hepburn movies and really overdid the 50's accent. A big part of the plot (such as it was) was that she was a close lookalike to Elizabeth Short, AKA the Black Dahlia. Since this role was played by Mia Kirshner, that kind of fell apart. Truthfully, Jolene Blalock bore a stronger resemblance. In fact, when I first saw Swank, I thought it was Blalock.
Although the murder of Short is supposed to be the driving force of the plot, we go almost a third of the way in before that happens, and the real plot is a three-way relationship between two cops (played by Josh Hartnett and Aaron Eckhart) and Scarlett Johannson, the girlfriend of Eckhart's character.
My overall opinion is that the movie was OK but tried too hard. There was a lot of atmosphere, voice-overs, about five doublecrosses too many and everybody smoked way too many cigarettes. Still, for $4 bucks and not having to run to the video store, not a bad deal.
Hilary Swank, playing the femme fatale, seemed to have spent a weekend closeted up with old Katherine Hepburn movies and really overdid the 50's accent. A big part of the plot (such as it was) was that she was a close lookalike to Elizabeth Short, AKA the Black Dahlia. Since this role was played by Mia Kirshner, that kind of fell apart. Truthfully, Jolene Blalock bore a stronger resemblance. In fact, when I first saw Swank, I thought it was Blalock.
Although the murder of Short is supposed to be the driving force of the plot, we go almost a third of the way in before that happens, and the real plot is a three-way relationship between two cops (played by Josh Hartnett and Aaron Eckhart) and Scarlett Johannson, the girlfriend of Eckhart's character.
My overall opinion is that the movie was OK but tried too hard. There was a lot of atmosphere, voice-overs, about five doublecrosses too many and everybody smoked way too many cigarettes. Still, for $4 bucks and not having to run to the video store, not a bad deal.
