Country:
USA
Recognizable Faces:
Robert Downey Jr.
Val Kilmer
Michelle Monaghan
Shannyn Sossamon
Directed By:
Shane Black
I don't watch movies as much as I used to. Writing, training, video games, life and crap, flooding our cinemas kept me away from the big screen much. Once in a while, I feel the need to talk about a movie. Usually, that means it's exceptionally good or exceptionally bad. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang belongs to the first category.
Let's face it, I like noir as much as the next guy, but it's a genre that has been beaten to death, especially in its classic, Los Angeles-bound form. Thankfully, there are people like Dennis Lehane and David Simon, breathing a new life into the genre. Shane Black's Kiss Kiss Bang Bang is another twist on the renewal of the genre. While staying in the uber-cliche L.A, this movies goes somewhere else.
STORYTELLING
Harry Lockhart (Downey) is a low-life criminal in the City of Angels and the narrator of this story. While running from the police after breaking and entering a toy store, Harry finds himself caught in a movie audition, which needs him to act a scene very similar to what he had just been through. He gets the part and is propelled into the ever fake world of Hollywood.
There, he'll meet characters like Gay Perry (Val Kilmer) and Harmony Faith Lane (Michelle Monaghan), which he happened to have known during his childhood. One things come to another, he ends up sleeping with her friend and leaves her pissed off and unsatisfied. Perry, a strong motor to the story, brings in Harry in an errand he has to run for a woman named Allison Ames. Over there, they find the body of a young woman in the water and their troubles begin....
DIRECTING
The movie is really colourful. Noir is usually around the shades of grey and brown of the city, but Kiss Kiss Bang Bang wears the colours of Hollywood. The choice of the first person narrator brings in a unique touch to the story and the editing, but it's cumbersome more than anything. Downey does a good job at being this naive protagonist, out of a real marvellous novel, but he would've shined more in the third person. A distant protagonist (I.E. The Big Lebowski) Would've given the characters more life.
The direction is dynamic, but obstrusive at times. It's something that's not rare for movies that are a little more artsy, but it's not everybody's cup of tea. The story is character driven, but a stronger focus on the tale would've made them shine more.
ACTING
Downey is good, but the shining star of that movie is Val Kilmer. Not unlike Tom Cruise in Tropic Thunder, he seems to excel when he's asked to play an over-the-top comical role. Gay Perry is the most unique character of them all. He's a jaded veteran of the movie industry. He had seen it all, sex, drugs, rock n' roll, even death. His professional approach to the ongoing drama is hilarious.
Good, but not overshadowing the star of the show are Downey and Michelle Monaghan. They have a believable, troublesome romance in between two people that life had left broken-hearted. They embody this desperate search for meaning that people go through as they realize they get old and they're not superstars. Strong acting kept this movie together.
INTEREST
I'm almost sure you rarely came across a story like this. A noir with little to no cops involved and little to no bandits either. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang is a spoof of Hollywood and its effect on people. The artificial lifestyle that is depicted as being "what real life is about".
The side of this story that got to me the most was the Downey-Monaghan romance. Henry Rollins, in one of his numerous Spoken Word shows, has described Los Angeles as a city where no one comes from. Where everybody goes to take their chance at the American Dream. That's what Kiss Kiss Bang Bang is. A strangely accurate look at Hollywood through a distorted, comedic crime fiction scenario. I had been told about this movie years ago, but I only watched it last week-end. Don't do like me, don't wait, check it out.
NOTE:B+
