A Scanner Darkly
Director: Richard Linklater
Rated: M
Now Screening


'A Scanner Darkly' is an excellent adaptation of an identically titled Philip K Dick novel about drug use, hallucinatory states of mind and dysfunctional society.

Bob Arctor (Keanu Reeves) is an undercover narcotics agent in near-future Los Angeles where government, with an increasingly desperate Machiavellian methodology, and society, pervaded by a highly damaging and addictive drug named 'Substance D', are in the throes of decay. His job generally involves reporting on his erratic and sometimes volatile housemates Barris (Robert Downey Jr) and Luckmann (Woody Harrelson), as well as finding a way to infiltrate D's mysterious dealer-supplier hierarchy. He has a vaguely romantic relationship with cocaine addict Donna (Winona Ryder), as well as an extensive affiliation with the drugs of his social context; D in particular. Arctor's already dangerous and precarious situation is complicated irreparably by D, which progressively separates the two hemispheres of his brain, leading to a gradual slide away from reality and some severe and very literal identity confusion.

Writer-director Richard Linklater's film is unusually faithful to the original text, and not only in its scripting. The film's flimsy narrative structure, monotonal flow, awkward humour, and general lack of concern for audience interest have all been deftly adapted.

Of particular note is the capturing of the reality-confusion of Arctor's condition, which has been achieved largely through the skilled and rigorous application of a highly developed Rotoscoping (live action traced over by animators) technique. The soon-to-be apocalyptic environment, inside and out, is always warping or leering or shrinking in ways both horrifying and funny, and every image projected seems (and in a way is) more like illusory light hovering uneasily over a latent, foreign reality than a genuine reflection.

All the main cast manage to integrate the educated-bourgeois and messy-underclass aspects of their characters convincingly, and in Downey Jr's and Harrelson's case with substantial humour. Ryder reveals her fine performing ability as the film progresses, and Reeves is sublimely unexceptional and indistinct as the 'vague blur' Arctor, a performance that ranks among his best.

The film is perhaps less unnerving than it could be, with the animation tending gloss over a lot of the grit of junkie life. But as an expression of the illusion of modern life, 'A Scanner Darkly' is superb.

Wil McGinley