Plot Details: This opinion reveals major details about the movie's plot.

I went into work one morning and found sitting on my desk a stack of 15 DVDs, most of them horror, from one of my co-workers. Sorting through them, I already had one, and the rest I’d never heard of with two exceptions. One was a loaner for my daughter, while the other familiar one was this movie, BLACK DAHLIA. Or so I thought it was familiar.

Obviously, the movie I thought he’d loaded me was the 2006 Brian DePalma movie with Mia Kirshner in the title role. What I got was not so much. Instead, this was the 2006 direct to DVD version directed by Ulli Lommel. That’s ok, I thought; it reads on the DVD cover, “From the director of The Boogeyman.” Okay, well, BOOGEYMAN was, in my opinion, a failure, but it was a good looking movie, at least.

Again, not so much. Whereas I thought the box was referring to the 2005 Stephen Kay movie with Barry Watson and Emily Deschanel, what it actually meant was the 1980 movie starring John Carradine and Suzanne Love. So.

Lommel has been directing since 1974, so it should stand to reason BLACK DAHLIA should project some sense of a filmmaker who knows what he’s doing. And that was my third strike. Oh, if only that meant I was out and didn’t have to sit through this thing.

BLACK DAHLIA does not tell the story of the real “Black Dahlia” killing of Elizabeth Short in 1947. Instead, this story is set in present day Los Angeles and follows a rookie cop as he tries to track down the culprit behind a series of copycat murders.

Meanwhile, in an abandoned jail, a casting call is being held for a movie called BLACK DAHLIA. Only when the actresses show up, their audition is to be strapped to a table and murdered by an obviously insane woman in a school girl uniform and her two silent thugs, one a shirtless man in a stained butcher’s apron and a black leather mask, the other a man in a crude baseball uniform wearing a batter’s helmet with a football helmet faceguard over the front. The fact these are the only three people at the audition and that they’re all covered in blood splatter doesn’t seem to faze or confuse any of the auditioning actresses. Granted, I’ve never been to an audition, but I think three people in an abandoned jail all covered in blood would raise my suspicions.

While the rookie cop, Rick, finds himself becoming obsessed with the real Elizabeth Short, through a series of internet searches he finds a connection between a movie producer who was going to work with Short in 1947 and the casting call for the BLACK DAHLIA movie being made. Well, it’s not really being made, it’s just a front for the murders, but you know what I mean.

While Rick’s partner is boozing it up at the bar, Rick goes to the jail and heads into the scene alone, without backup, by himself, and it’s not a good call. Luckily his partner sobers up just long enough to answer Rick’s page and the cavalry swoops in just as Rick has been strapped to the kill table and his eyeball plucked out with a pair of tongs.

Yes, BLACK DAHLIA is a gory movie, very much so. Lommel certainly didn’t shy away from showing the goods. There is a ton of blood in this movie, as well as lots of severed body parts and half a dozen kill scenes. In fact, the majority of the movie is taken up by these kill scenes and the case could be made for this movie only existing so Ulli Lommel had a reason to film as much gratuitous gore as he could cram into one film. I mean it certainly wasn’t an intense character piece, and it wasn’t in an effort to answer once and for all what really happened to Elizabeth Short--although both of things did come across in this movie, as we see Rick’s character development and a fictionalized resolution to Short’s case does indeed come about. But those weren’t the reasons Lommel made this movie.

Considering some of his other movies around this same time were ZODIAC KILLER (2005), B.T.K. KILLER (2005), GREEN RIVER KILLER (2005), followed by SON OF SAM (2008) and D.C. SNIPER (2010), it becomes apparent Lommel isn’t in the business of making art (funny thing, considering he worked with Andy Warhol on COCAINE COWBOYS in 1979), and instead is just sensationalizing America’s fascination with serial killings (granted, the Black Dahlia case wasn’t a serial killing, but it is the most famous unsolved murder in American history). Or rather, he would be sensationalizing them, if they didn’t look like utter crap. Admittedly, I’m working strictly from the example of BLACK DAHLIA as I’ve not seen any of Lommel’s other movies, but if this is the quality of his work 32 years in, then someone needs to have a talk with him about goals, standards, or maybe a new line of work.

In the acting department, this was only the second movie for both principles, Elissa Dowling (Kate, the schoolgirl-clad ringleader) and Sutton Christopher (Det. Rick--also his last movie), and it shows. I wouldn’t be surprised to discover this was the only movie for a lot of the actors, and rightfully so. Please please, everyone, go back to your shift at Denny’s, someone’s Moons over My Hammy are getting cold. I will have to give Dowling credit, though, for living the dream. Since starring in this movie in 2006 (her 2nd movie, remember), she’s racked up a total of 57 movies in 6 years, some of them even decent movies like the 2009 After Dark Horrorfest movie DREAD. That same year she was also in VAGINAL HOLOCAUST and then in 2010’s DAHMER VS. GACY, so, you know, take from that what you will. Myself, I’m just surprised I found a valid a reason to use the words VAGINAL HOLOCAUST in a sentence.

The effects here consist mostly of tons of blood and a small number of rubber severed body parts, like a leg, half a foot, a hand. They were nothing special, used strictly for shock value.

The third biggest problem I had with this movie, and the one I think is really going to turn off the most viewers, was the editing. Aside from the acting, aside from the cheap video quality of the film, the editing by Christian Behm (credited a Xgen, and also starring in the movie as Det. Christian), was a disgrace. Someone was having way too much fun with all the fancy buttons on their editing machine. We’ve got slow motion, we’ve got black and white, we’ve got a few instances of reversed footage, we’ve got several shots that just repeat 3 or 4 times, as well as too many shots to count of footage just repeating on top of itself, so we’re watching the same scene play out in layers, all simultaneously. It’s headache inducing and is the true downfall of an already bad movie. My advice, when your movie sucks, don’t assume fancy editing is going to make it better. Just let it suck and try to do better next time. I mean, the dude’s been making movies almost as long as I’ve been alive, he should not be turning out work this cheap.

Ulle Lommel’s BLACK DAHLIA is a train wreck from the first frame to the last. You can watch this movie, but you won’t be doing yourself any favors. It’s not even cheesy fun, not really. I’d put this movie only a cut or two above a piece of crap like Carlos Batts’s AMERICAN GOTHIC, and only because this movie has a mostly-coherent story. But it’s not a good time. So do yourself and your DVD player a favor and steer clear of this one.

Recommended: No

Viewing Format: DVD
Video Occasion: Good for a Rainy Day
Suitability For Children: Not suitable for Children of any age