As is the case with so many films, I wanted to see A Scanner Darkly on the big screen, but didn't manage it. This is a review of the DVD version (not including the special features" -- I seldom find those worth messing with on any DVD; if you're interested in running commentary and a "making of" documentary, they are there, though).

As is not usually the case, I wanted to see A Scanner Darkly before reading the book. It looked interesting enough that I felt I'd rather immerse myself in it than go through the problem of unfulfilled expectations. So I did.

First thing: The film is animated, through a process called "rotoscoping." That is, it was filmed live, then the animation was superimposed on, or blended into, the "real" stuff. So, Keanu Reeves looks like Keanu Reeves ... except when he isn't supposed to ... and so forth.

I've heard/read some criticism of this aspect of the film, but I found it to be very effective for what I assume was the creators' purpose. The film features drug addiction, associated mental disconnects, and other assorted dystopian themes. The combination of a reasonably well-known and recognizable cast with the animation technique heightens the feeling of "real people in an increasingly unreal world."

Brief plot summary:

"Agent Fred" is a counter-narcotics officer, investigating a house full of really far-beyond-the-pale drug users. He's also one of those drug users, Bob Arctor. One effect of the drug du jour, "Substance D," is that it causes competition between the hemispheres of the brain, possibly resulting in multiple personalities. As the film progresses, it becomes increasingly unclear whether or not "Agent Fred" knows that he's also Bob Arctor ... and increasingly clear that if he does know, he's fast losing touch with that knowledge.

The film is very much a deus ex machina story -- Fred/Arctor is a pawn in a larger plot that reveals itself slowly. He's meant to be in the position he's in, and he's been put there by parties unknown, for unknown reasons.

The film alludes to, but does not expose in great detail, an overarching "surveillance society." When not "in character," police officers wear high-tech disguise suits that cause their appearance to shift constantly, so that even their fellow officers wouldn't recognize them on the street. Phone calls are monitored for possible criminal content, with satellites available to zoom in visually on their points of origin. Everyone is -- or might be -- both an informant and a criminal. Nothing is what it seems, and drug-induced paranoia shifts everyone and everything even farther out than where one would expect to find it.

Getting pretty weird, isn't it? And it gets weirder yet ... but I don't want to get into spoiler territory. Aside from Reeves, the cast includes:

Winona Ryder as Donna, Arctor's girlfriend and ostensibly the target of his investigation -- he's supposed to "roll her up" and discover who supplies her with "Substance D."

Robert Downey, Jr. as Barris, an over-the-top "know-it-all paranoid" whose antics constantly threaten to spill over into outright violence -- and who, like everyone else, has his own secret agenda. Downey's performance is probably the strongest in the film ... he nails it.

Woody Harrelson as Luckman, who's apparently there to fill a general "juvenile hell-raiser" niche. Another good performance, but in a limited capacity. He just doesn't have that much to do apart from comic relief. And ...

Rory Cochrane as Freck, a character who has reached the end of his "Substance D" rope and is in the process of final personal disintegration at the beginning of the film. The opening scene sets the tone with Freck in an "I'm covered with bugs!" ballet right out of the old scare literature of my youth.

For me, A Scanner Darkly ... well ... works. It's a downer, but then it's supposed to be. I mean, c'mon ... it's about drug addiction, paranoia, mental collapse and a police state, and it's based on a Philip K. Dick story. What did you expect, Mary Poppins?

The actors all turn in good performances, but they're also under constraints of range -- the drug and the political/police environment both contain them within strict behavioral parameters. There's no possibility of a happy ending, or even more than momentary, fleeting happiness here. At most, there's room for outbursts of rage or confusion, and those make their appearances. There's not a lot of high-form action here, either. It's all either hallucinated or implied, with the stress of those hallucinations and implications feeding right back into the paranoia.

I have to give this film the highest rating for being very good at what its makers intended it to be -- a dystopia should leave the viewer feeling wrung out and exhausted. This one does. It is definitely not a movie of the "get some popcorn and play footsie on the couch" variety. I'll be purchasing the DVD (and reading the novel), because I'm a fan of dystopia and this is dystopia done well.

Recommended:
Yes

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