Killer Apps.
In Evil Marketing-speak, a “Killer App” is something that convinces the Average Consumer to commit and buy a new piece of hardware. While it’s initial intended definition referred to software, as technology has become more and more pervasive, it’s been expanded over the years to include ANYTHING that shakes us out of our current disinterest and compels us to buy into something new. For example:
Aubrey got me a PS3 for my birthday earlier this year. I wanted one, primarily, because of this.
A Blu-ray director’s cut of one of the most under-rated films of all time.
Dark City isn’t just good, it’s ridiculously, mind-bogglingly good. If you liked The Matrix, this is the movie the Wachowski’s stole all of the good bits from. And part of the set, for that matter.
The theatrical release of Dark City was a flawed work, largely due to the meddling of The Studio. They forced director Alex Proyas to include a voice-over introduction to the film that – I kid you not – ruins nearly every surprise in the movie. For years now, fans have been loaning their DVDs to friends with strange instructions demanding that they mute their TVs for the first minute or so of the film. But no more – the hateful voice-over has been removed in this release (which is, in my view, worth the entire price of a PS3 and the Blu-ray disc).
I will now rally giants to my cause. Roger Ebert LOOOOOVES this movie – giving it not only a four star review upon release, but also adding a subsequent “Great Movies” review in 2005.
Roger has done commentary tracks for the DVD releases of two movies. One of them is Citizen Kane. The other is Dark City.
Some words from R-Dawg:
[From 1998]
“Dark City” by Alex Proyas is a great visionary achievement, a film so original and exciting, it stirred my imagination like “Metropolis” and “2001: A Space Odyssey.” If it is true, as the German director Werner Herzog believes, that we live in an age starved of new images, then “Dark City” is a film to nourish us. Not a story so much as an experience, it is a triumph of art direction, set design, cinematography, special effects–and imagination.
…
Is the film for teenage boys and comic book fans? Not at all, although that’s the marketing pitch. It’s for anyone who still has a sense of wonder and a feeling for great visual style. This film contains ideas and true poignance, a story that has been thought out and has surprises right to the end. It’s romantic and exhilarating. Watching it, I realized the last dozen films I’d seen were about people standing around, talking to one another. “Dark City” has been created and imagined as a new visual place for us to inhabit. It adds treasure to our notions of what can be imagined.
[From 2005]
In October, I went through “Dark City” a shot at a time for four days at the Hawaii Film festival, with moviegoers who were as curious as I was. We froze frames, we dissected special effects, we debated the meaning of the film, and our numbers even included a psychiatrist who told us of the original Daniel Schreber, a schizophrenic whose book on his condition influenced Freud and Jung.
Sometimes during the shot-by-shot analysis, we simply froze a frame and regarded it. Some of the street scenes echo paintings by Edward Hopper or Jack Vettriano. This is not only a beautiful film but a generous one, which supplies rich depth and imagination and many more details than are really necessary to tell the story. Small wonder that the name Bumstead appears, perhaps in honor of Henry Bumstead, one of the greatest Hollywood art directors. The world created by the Strangers seems borrowed from 1940s film noir; we see fedoras, cigarettes, neon signs, automats, older cars (and some newer ones — the world is not consistent). Proyas wrote the screenplay with David S. Goyer and Lem Dobbs; the screenplays Dobbs wrote for “Kafka” and Goyer wrote for “Batman Begins” contain some of the same notes sounded here.
…
I believe more than ever that “Dark City” is one of the great modern films. It preceded “The Matrix” by a year (both films used a few of the same sets in Australia), and on a smaller budget, with special effects that owe as much to imagination as to technology, did what “The Matrix” wanted to do, earlier and with more feeling.
It’s true that this Director’s Cut is also available on Plain, Old DVD as well, but it never would have seen the light of day if not for Blu-Ray. Ebert recorded his SECOND commentary for the film three years ago, indicating that the new cut was ready then, but ignored by Evil Bastards for reasons known only to the dark and horrible demons that rule their hearts and minds. Thus, I loves me some Blu-Ray and – by extension – the PS3. I enjoyed MGS4, to be sure, but it was Dark City that compelled me to own the console.
So, seriously, go watch this movie.
And speaking of things that make you support things you never thought possible, I am now, apparently, a Jets fan:
Holy crap the Jets? As a Giant fan I’m not sure how I feel about this….
Congrats to Brett and the Jets. B-R-E-T-T Brett Brett Brett?
Thats going to be a good team.
I consider that point where Keifer gives the dude the brain shot and “teaches” him how to use his psychic powers through memory one of the 5 greatest movie moments ever. It is so moving and so evocative. Damn you for going to make me buy a movie I should damn well own!