Title: Dark City: Director’s Cut (1998)
Director: Alex Proyas
Cast: Rufus Sewell, Jennifer Connelly, Kiefer Sutherland,
William Hurt, Richard O’Brien
Dark City was a victim of the Titanic syndrome, an ailment
that struck any of the films that were unfortunate enough to be released during
the time that James Cameron’s Titanic (1998) was cruising through theaters. But
let’s face it, Titanic wasn’t the only element Dark City had going against it.
To begin with, Dark City is a dark brooding film that most people would find
either: a) boring b) confusing or c) too talky. But for the right group of
people, Dark City would prove to be an engrossing, gothic tale of lost
identities and discovering one’s true self, one’s true potential. You see, this
is the story of John Murdoch, a man who wakes up one day, not knowing who he
is. He does know one thing though: something is seriously wrong in this city! You
see, a strange thing happens when the clocks strike twelve; everyone in the
city falls asleep and things begin to change. Literally, the whole city begins
to contort and twist until by the end of the event, the city is completely
different, and as the city changes, so do the people who inhabit it. At one
point you might have been a humble blue collar worker, but by the end of the
change, you might end up being a member of high society. Strange beings dressed
in black go around the city changing things, what’s really going on here? And
why doesn’t John Murdock fall under the spell that everybody seems to be so susceptible
to? Is there something special about John Murdoch?
Dark City was yet another one of those movies that studios
don’t know how to sell. And if there’s one thing I’ve learned about films is
that when a studio and a director get cold feet, the movie will suffer. The problem is the general feeling of
uncertainty as to how audiences will receive the film. Once this happens, the
studio looses faith in the project and they won’t market it properly, because
they figure what’s the point of spending money in a movie they think will tank?
On top of that, the filmmaker looses faith in his original vision which usually
means he or she will edit the film down to a more digestible form, dumbing it
down in hopes that audiences will “get it”. A similar thing happened with
Ridley Scott’s fantasy film, Legend (1985). When Scott turned in his cut of
Legend and showed it to a test audience, the film scored horribly. Scott,
terrified that his movie would tank edited the film down, shot a couple of new
scenes to make the film “cooler” and added the more contemporary Tangerine
Dream soundtrack as opposed to the original classical score. Sadly, the film
tanked anyways. In situations like these, I think it’s best for directors to stick
to their guns and their original artistic vision. But they never do, because when
there’s so many millions of dollars at stake, everybody gets cold feet. Especially
when this is your second film and you want to establish yourself as a profitable
filmmaker the way Proya’s was at the time of making Dark City.
So Alex Proyas made the changes he had to in order to make
Dark City more digestible to audiences. He added in a voice over that “explained”
everything before hand to audiences, not unlike the voice over that was added
to Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner (1982). I’m using Ridley Scott as an example a
lot because he is a director that has faced this situation often, making a film
that studios are uncertain of. Weird thing with films like this is that years
pass, the film becomes a cult classic and then the inevitable “director’s cut”
of the film is released, which is what happened with Dark City. People discovered it on home video after its
initial theatrical release and then got its directors cut. The changes aren’t
all that huge, but they do make the film more complete. The biggest changes I
detected were the elimination of the introductory voice over, some scenes are
longer, with more expository dialog, also Jennifer Connelly actually sings with
her own voice in her night club scenes, as opposed to getting her voiced dubbed
the way it was in the theatrical cut.
The film is strong both visually and thematically. Yet when
it was released, its stylish gothic visuals brought some critics to actually
label Dark City as style over substance type of film, which couldn’t be further
from the truth. If anything this movie is all about substance. Society is being
analyzed by those in power, who constantly shift things around. Those scenes in
which the whole city landscape twists and contorts are representative of the
constant urban renewals. In the film, society sleeps while those in power,
hiding behind shadows and darkness manipulate everything, if that isn’t
representative of the world we live in, I don’t know what is. The main
character, John Murdoch speaks volumes about those of us who are awake, those
of us who aren’t sheep, we know something isn’t right. The main character is
confused, because life is a mystery, but he moves on, searching for that
ultimate truth. I love the fact that he gets things done because he develops
mental powers, literally making things happen by using his brains. What Alex
Proyas is speaking about here is not conforming, not being a follower but
rather, that we should take control of our lives, literally changing our surroundings
until we find ultimate happiness. But there’s always that constant search for
the truth inspite of all the distractions and the muddled facts.
Dark City is not without influences. It reminded me of Metropolis
(1927) (something that Roger Ebert, a staunch defender of Dark City also agrees
with) because the city is a like a main character. Same as Fritz Lang’s amazing
futuristic vistas in Metropolis, a lot was put into making Dark City’s titular city
a wonder to behold. Alex Proyas mixed old school filmmaking techniques with
some new ones by using miniatures, paintings and computer generated images to
bring this mysterious Dark City to life. The art direction is outstanding,
Proya’s use of lights and shadows and the wardrobe makes everything look retro
with lots of film noir going for it. Thematically speaking they have similarities
as well because both films deal with class issues, albeit in different ways; for
example in Metropolis society is presented with the idea that the rich and
powerful and the working class should work together for the benefit of all, a
sort of idealistic take on the matter, while Dark City takes a diametrically
opposed stance, it wants to wake up the sleeper, the worker bee. It proposes
the idea of waking up the sleeping masses so that they can become masters of their
own destiny, cutting through all the bull crap that was inserted in their mind
from inception. So as you can see, the film is not a flimsy one, it has lots to
say. Top all that with a great cast, including Rufus Sewell, Jennifer Connelly,
Kiefer Sutherland and William Hurt and astonishing gothic art direction and you’ve
got yourselves a winner of a movie meant to be enjoyed for generations to come.
Rating: 5 out of 5
