An undercover cop in a not-too-distant future becomes involved with a dangerous new drug and begins to lose his own identity as a result.An undercover cop in a not-too-distant future becomes involved with a dangerous new drug and begins to lose his own identity as a result.An undercover cop in a not-too-distant future becomes involved with a dangerous new drug and begins to lose his own identity as a result.
- Awards
- 4 wins & 21 nominations
- Waitress
- (as Natasha Valdez)
- Director
- Writers
- All cast & crew
- Production, box office & more at IMDbPro
Storyline
Did you know
- TriviaRobert Downey, Jr. wrote most of his lines down on post-it notes and scattered them around the set so he could read off them while filming a scene. The rotoscoping team simply animated over the notes to remove them from the film during post-production.
- GoofsWhile showing the monitoring equipment, Hank tells Fred that he could be anyone from Arctor's circle of friends, including Barris. This made sense in the book, however, by this time in the movie Hank has already seen Fred alongside Barris, so he could not possibly think they are the same person.
- Quotes
Fred: [voiceover] What does a scanner see? Into the head? Down into the heart? Does it see into me? Into us? Clearly or darkly? I hope it sees clearly because I can't any longer see into myself. I see only murk. I hope for everyone's sake the scanners do better, because if the scanner sees only darkly the way I do, then I'm cursed and cursed again.
- Crazy creditsThe "Phil" mentioned in the "in memoriam" list as having permanent pancreatic damage is Philip K. Dick himself.
- SoundtracksFog
Written by Thom Yorke (as Thomas Yorke), Phil Selway (as Philip Selway), Jonny Greenwood (as Jonathan Greenwood),
Colin Greenwood and Ed O'Brien (as Edward O'Brien)
Performed by Radiohead
Courtesy of Capitol Records
Under licence from EMI Film & Television Music
This is much, much better. It attempts something that had structure and effect before it was a film. What it had going for it was Dick's (by now, finally) famous technique of layered observation, frangible motivation and passion. That passion was the most intense until "VALIS," and came from his own drugged life. It is a worthy book, possibly finding a new audience today with a new generation of thugs in government and drugs in life triggering newly emerging forms of paranoia.
What the film adds are some tricks that allow more literary internal dialog than is usual. I think it is simply because what we see is different enough that we allow the filmmaker more latitude than usual to extend conventional internal conventions: visions, dreams, metaphoric stories-within-stories and of course voice overs.
But there's more: It has some actors that understand the effects required. Robert Downey Jr in particular chills. This is his personal story as well. His own disaster was caused in large measure by our intrusion into his life, and having us literally watch him while the story is about being watched makes it more visceral and disturbing than the book could ever be.
The animation technique employed here works for me in all regards except one. That's because it is something still unfamiliar, between the abstraction of cartoon and the texture of "reality." The idea of pulling colors from the filmed palette is wise.
What fails for me is the cloaking device, which in the book is simply a blurring. Here what they try to do is serially overlay many visual personalities. I understand the practical reason; our eye needs to be kept busy. But it fights the terms of the alternative world they have created with the other elements of the technique, which have a calmness that we accept because it is closer to natural than artificial. It may be simply that the animators had to design roughly because of the number required, and these seem more cartoony than whatever else we see.
But all in all, I allow the deficiencies, and I suppose you will too.
Ted's Evaluation -- 3 of 3: Worth watching.
- tedg
- Oct 7, 2008
Details
- Release date
- Country of origin
- Official site
- Language
- Also known as
- Затьмарення
- Filming locations
- Production companies
- See more company credits at IMDbPro
Box office
- Budget
- $8,700,000 (estimated)
- Gross US & Canada
- $5,501,616
- Opening weekend US & Canada
- $391,672
- Jul 9, 2006
- Gross worldwide
- $7,659,918
- Runtime1 hour 40 minutes
- Color
- Sound mix
- Aspect ratio
- 1.85 : 1