Brick

I find it hard to believe that this movie was filmed with one camera, edited on a home computer, with a score recorded in bits and pieces via the one onboard microphone of said home computer. It boggles the mind. The film looks great. It sounds great. It's a top-notch production. This is not your typical rinky-dink one-man masterpiece. With Brick (2005), Rian Johnson joins an exclusive club of great directorial debuts whose members include The Coen Brothers' Blood Simple (1984), Sam Mendes's American Beauty (1999), Frank Darabont's stunningly good The Shawshank Redemption (1994), Quentin Tarantino's Reservoir Dogs (1992), and John Huston's classic noir The Maltese Falcon (1941), featuring the great Humphrey Bogart as the iconic P.I. Sam Spade. It is this last comparison that is the most fitting. Brick is a rarity: a neo-noir that actually works, paying homage to the gritty realism and twisty-turny plot of Huston's Falcon.

Brendan Frye (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) is a street-tough and street-smart San Clemente high school student who dabbles in the California burg's small-time underground drug trade. But Brendan is about to get a whole lot more involved after his ex-girlfriend Emily disappears following a tense and mysterious phone conversation with Brendan. Our young Sam Spade follows the only leads he can glean from Emily's hysteria: the words "pin" and "brick." To track down San Clemente's drug baron known only as The Pin (Lukas Haas), Brendan must wade through a river of the town's underground players: Dode, Emily's latest drug-addled boyfriend; Kara, an icy and manipulative bitch and Brendan's one-time girl; Tugger, the Pin's violent and mercurial right-hand man; and Laura, the sexy rich girl with mysterious motives, the "dame" if you will.

Nathan Johnson's incredible score hearkens back to the quirky instrumental exploration by Anton Karas in The Third Man (1949). Johnson (director Rian Johnson's cousin) maintains the ominous air of the classic noir score, often falling back to a single instrument that slowly spins out the distance between bursts of dialog. The score also features some off-beat instrumentation, including the use of furniture, filing cabinets, and kitchen utensils.

My one big gripe with this movie is Johnson's dialog scripting. This is the one aspect of the film where it seems he's just trying too hard to reach that noir feel. Everything is slang and codespeak, an annoying mixture of modern terms and anachronistic verbage. In the mouths of these high schoolers, the dialog seems forced, recalled from memory by rote. More than anything, it reminds me of Baz Luhrman's vile and ill-conceived Shakespearian retread Romeo + Juliet (1996). Luckily, the thoughtful characterizations and flash-bang action of the film are a welcome distraction from some of the more painful speaking sequences.

I have heard many praise this film and its director as the next great thing in cinema. Johnson's eagerly awaited sophomore effort, The Brothers Bloom, is in theaters now, so it remains to be seen if the hype will pan out. For my part, I enjoyed the film for its successful take on noir, for its strangely compelling score, and for some superb performances by Gordon-Levitt and Haas. Is it the best thing since 7-Up? Nah. But it's not too shabby either.

Storyline & plot: 7/10
Cinematography & effects: 7/10
Music & mood: 10/10
Performances: 7/10

The Reverend says: 7/10