Reviews: July 2006 Archives

In the near-future science fiction world of A Scanner Darkly, narc agents are polymorphous detectives, wearing “scramble suits” that cycle, both visually and aurally, through scores of identity fragments to avoid detection by face-recognition systems. It’s a striking idea in literature, and in film even more so — especially in this film, which places a layer of abstraction between its cinematography and its audience, retracing the filmed images of easily recognizable actors as moody, moving line drawings. When the technique was used for the movie-length freshman-dorm-room conversation that was Waking Life, it felt precious and gimmicky. Applied to a more downbeat brand of existentialism, like this free-flowing, almost meditative version of Philip K. Dick’s classic novel about the tactics of drug police and the personal costs of addiction, it’s a kind of genius.