Keanu And RDJ Get Animated

Texan Richard Linklater's 2006 movie A Scanner Darkly looks unlike almost any other film, having been shot and originally edited like any live-action film, and then "animated" by computers, with lines drawn over lines already filmed to make everything and everyone look like a cartoon. The result is pretty amazing...

By Katey Margolis

May 13, 2010

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Texan Richard Linklater's 2006 movie A Scanner Darkly looks unlike almost any other film, having been shot and originally edited like any live-action film, and then "animated" by computers, with lines drawn over lines already filmed to make everything and everyone look like a cartoon. The result is pretty amazing and remarkably apropos for the story being told. From what may be the late, great Philip K. Dick's best novel ever, the film follows an undercover cop, Bob Arctor (Keanu Reeves), sometime in the future. In an effort to infiltrate the drug culture surrounding the powerful psychoactive (and fictional) drug Substance D, Arctor has become an addict himself. Woody Harrelson and Robert Downey Jr. play his addict friends, and Winona Ryder plays Arctor's love interest and potential informer, but neither the love nor the informing works out for Arctor and things really get screwed up. Filled with Dick's usual sinister characters, overwhelming darkness and future technology, A Scanner Darkly is one idea of what might become of our failed war on drugs. There may also be a twist (wink, wink). See what happens midnight Friday or Saturday at the Inwood Theater, 5458 W. Lovers Lane at Inwood. Tickets are $10. Call 214-764-9106 or visit landmarktheatres.com for information.
Fri., May 14; Sat., May 15, 2010

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