A Scanner Darkly: Review

I just finished watching A Scanner Darkly an animated film about... Well what it's about is a good question. It follows the story of a group of people, and their relation to a mysterious drug "D".

The Animation is very interesting, possibly the most interesting aspect of the movie. Everything is distorted, and at strange angles, with a sort of cell shaded look to it. Because of the bizarre perspectives, things that were once the background can suddenly pop out into the front when a character grabs a bottle, or opens a door. It adds a feeling that something isn't quite right, and fits in with he theme of a story about drugs. It almost makes you feel like you're on something yourself.



Unfortunately the story isn't that great. It uses to much of the "THERE IS NO SPOON" storytelling that the matrix used, leaving you with a sense of saying "What if we lived here!" although you can't really think that, because of the dystopian nature of the film. I was expecting the story to be a bit more cyberpunk, however the setting is very rural, suburban areas. It's an interesting contrast to see this kind of story take place in.
The movie tries to be futuristic Requiem For A Dream but rightly fails to be so.
As for the end... It's horridly anticlimactic. I was literally waiting for all hell to break lose at the end of the movie, and nothing happened. It left me screaming for a but more of the story.
One of the characters (Who reminds me of Kurt Cobain, is totally ignored in the end of the movie. No explanation is given, while other characters that are great fun to see are just sort of snuffed off in a few sentences of internal monologue. )

I don't regret watching it, but to contrast it to something else... I find it is like playing Crysis. I played it entirely for the technical beauty of it, while the story played second wing. The artistic direction of this movie is very awesome, and I would recommend seeing it just for that.