It has been almost ten years since Curtis Hanson delivered what was arguably the best picture of 1997, L.A. Confidential. That movie was great in almost every way (my key dislike was only in the performance of Kim Basinger, yet the Academy did not agree with me),and a big part of that was due to the source material from James Ellroy. And now comes The Black Dahlia, another one of Ellroy's books based on detectives in the 1940's, only revolving around a real event and having master filmmaker Brian De Palma at the helm. And unfortunately, the film comes with mixed results.

After taking part in a boxing match which ends up giving a whole lot more power to the L.A.P.D., Dwight "Bucky" Bleichert (Josh Hartnett) and Leland "Lee" Blanchard (Aaron Eckhart) are promoted to detectives and become partners. Shortly afterwards, they become entangled in the brutal murder of Elizabeth Short (Mia Kirshner),otherwise known as the titular Black Dahlia. What follows for them is a tale of corruption, greed and vengeance. It may not seem like much (not too mention the femme fatales of Scarlett Johansson and Hilary Swank),but the film really has a lot going on.

And this is where a bit of the problems lie.

Some of the events that occur over the course of the film, are just completely random and almost unexplainable. Hell, random subplots appear and disappear faster than they come up. When it really starts getting down to business, the movie becomes downright confusing, and the narrative does not let up for anyone to truly figure it all out. It gets especially bizarre in the final act, when almost nothing truly makes sense, and we just have to sit and just contend with what ends up happening. It makes it seem like they want the audience to sift through and determine what is relevant to the film and what is not, and only then can they truly grasp onto a full understanding. Even after watching the film a few hours ago, I still question some of the things that happened.

I think one of the key reasons it does not make a whole whack of sense is the fact that it revolves around a real event. Last week's Hollywoodland had this same problem in that the filmmakers do not seem to have an idea of where to draw your attention. Do they want the focus on the murder itself, or do they want the focus on the cops investigating it? Adding in a few seemingly bizarre backstories does not help this either. They seem to strike gold when they focalize on what the murder and its impending investigation is doing to Bucky and Lee, but they do not spend enough time expressing it. They touch on it in passing, and instead, cut to either useless items, or completely random things. You can tell that there is some form of direction however, just not enough.

Hartnett plays Bucky very smoothly, and does a very adequate job in his narration. He really lacks the zest to make his character interesting however, and has a really tough time trying to make the audience care about him. He just does not seem to have the hard-boiled cop schtick nailed down here, and only comes off as a little less than soft-boiled. Eckhart on the other hand, does have the zest and really shines through as Lee. His character goes through most of the changing during the film, and you can see the dramatic change of character as the film progresses. He just does not have nearly enough screen time to truly flesh him from being the strange and mysterious character.

Johansson does well for herself as the girl stuck between the two partners, and only sparingly gets the opportunity to stretch out her enigmatic character. Swank on the other hand, feels completely useless in the scheme of things (until her character actually serves a purpose later in the film). Her disappear/reappearing Scottish accent is laughable, and her whole performance really begs the question of how she has managed to snag two Best Actress Oscars in less than ten years. Supporting work, especially from Mike Starr, Fiona Shaw and the flashback heavy Kirshner, are all on the mark and are fairly well done in their limited roles.

Whereas there were problems with many other things, there are none with the sets, costumes and cinematography. This is 1940's Los Angeles, and it looks gorgeous. Every single minute detail seems to have been polished and amped up to the point of looking like it was filmed sixty years ago. It makes the film feel more realistic than it is, and makes the sheer "coolness" of the settings and characters stand right out. Although it may be advertised as being noir, it really is nowhere near as dark as it could have been. Yet, it still has enough packed into it to make this film visually astonishing.

Another standout is the feel of it being a De Palma film. The camera angles, the slow motion, the violence, the sheer editing of it all (especially the worn black and white film clips of Kirshner as Short),just screams old school De Palma. From the start, even with its problems, the audience knows it is in the hands of a style master, and in that regard, the film is consistent and on the mark.

But unfortunately, that same phrase cannot be used to describe the rest of the film. It is truly a mixed bag, but despite its confusing narrative, it is still interesting and stylish as hell. But I still cannot help but be disappointed overall. I guess I was just expecting a whole lot more.

7/10.

Now I like Brian DePalma, and I love Carrie, The Untouchables and Carlito's Way. Out of the films of his I've seen, The Black Dahlia is my least favourite in my view, though I was also rather disappointed in Scarface too.

I was really interested in its concept and the story seemed interesting. Also the film is very well made, with stylish cinematography and beautiful scenery, costumes, sets and makeup, DePalma's direction has occasional flashes of brilliance and the music was quite nice as well.

However, this is another case of style over substance. The script falls flat, with little idea of which direction to go, and the tone of the story is also uneven with some scenes disappointingly over-the top. The characters I felt indifferent to, and I also thought they were quite shallow and poorly explored, the pace is rather meandering and with exception of Fiona Shaw who's quite good the acting is bland. Also the ending I think is overdone.

All in all, interesting initially and while well made it is emotionally hollow and flat in its scripting and characterisation. 4/10 Bethany Cox

Despite its po-faced earnestness and basis on real-life events, THE BLACK DAHLIA is a film that's difficult to take seriously. It's another subdued, soulless effort from Brian de Palma, the director who could once do no wrong between the 1970s and the early 1990s but who now, like John Carpenter, appears to have lost the talent he once had. This is an overlong film noir, a hardboiled crime yarn featuring a pair of boxers-turned-detectives investigating the Black Dahlia murder in '40s-era Los Angeles. You can sense from the outset that de Palm's heart isn't really in it and who can blame him? He's saddled with a pair of distinctively unimpressive actors as his leads. Aaron Eckhart can be great when he wants to be (think THE DARK KNIGHT) but he can do little with the square-jawed, one-dimensional hero type he plays here. Josh Hartnett (SIN CITY) has the deeper role but didn't appear anything other than bland to this viewer. While it's nice to see Hilary Swank playing against type for once, the female lead is played by the unfortunate Scarlett Johansson, one of those actresses I feel is seriously overrated. The way she delivers some of her lines in this movie…words fail me, suffice to say she's anything but believable.

The muddled plot goes through the tired old clichés, de Palma attempts to put some UNTOUCHABLES style into one slow-mo set-piece and fails, and the ending tries to tie everything up neatly in a contrived, Hollywood cliché type way. In fact it would be a good idea just to go back and watch the Kevin Costner starrer instead of this weak revisitation of a similar era.