Name - Dark City
Released - 1998
Director - Alex Proyas
Another film or it could have been series that was recommended to me to watch recently was Dark City. There is the original film from back in 1998, so possibly a little dated by modern standards and then there has been a new spin-off series on netflix. Today I just decided to watch the film as the series I am not so sure about.
I couldn't remember the film when I was first recommended it but then once I started watching it, I remembered it well. It is one of my favorite sci-fi films. I couldn't remember it so well, so was keen to watch again and this time I could be more ascertive and enjoy it more.
The film has a pretty good cast and stars none other than Jennifer Connelly who is in the new netflix series Snowpiercer. I was surprised to learn that she is now 53, but looks pretty young in Dark City. It also has one of my favorite actors, Keifer Sutherland who is very underrated imo. I still remember him as a young dude back in The Lost Boys.
A very young Rufus Sewell is the main protagonist here and does really well. He is not so well known, but has done well here. The film has some twists that you might not expect and takes you into unexpected directions.
Some spoilers to follow if you haven't seen this classic. The film starts off in a very dark and eerie city that seems to be constantly in the night time. The characters all seem to have a bit of a foggy memory about things and there are a few who seem to be totally crazy.
However, this is because some alien dudes keep rearranging things every night, moving the city around, swapping peoples memories and possessions and for some it makes them abit crazy, others don't seem to notice, like NPCs we know here already. Some of the things they do are pretty weird, but some of them have a pretty evil streak and like to stab and cut people up. They setup various murder scenes and like to see how people react.
It seems they are soulless and trying to save themselves, but it is a weird way to go about things. In steps our hero who seems to have developed the same powers as them and like Neo from The Matrix, will look to save mankind, but first he wants to figure out where they are.
This takes us on a pretty interesting journey and my favorite scene is where you see the world where they are and how it is transformed with the sun and water. It is quite unusal for a film to portray the world as anything other than a blue marble, so it was quite interesting to see a different take on it and it reminded me of the film The Signal which is also about alien encounters.
The film is showing its age and is not so impressive with the special effects, but it still captures you and sucks you in. The aliens seem a later version of The Borg who were first seen around 10 years earlier in Star Trek Voyager I think. However, they seem to be less robotic but have the collective telepathic mind.
Overall, it is a pretty interesting film that takes you on a fun journey with a different sort of alien encounter that you usally get. It does make you question our reality abit more and makes you wonder about ourselves being portrayed as just our physical presence or if there is something more, and we have a soul. It also makes you wonder what aliens would do if they did come and what would they want.
Thanks for reading.
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