Virtual Suspense In ‘Strange Days’
Controlled feelings. Murder and mayhem in the streets. People addicted to virtual reality.
These three bizarre yet fascinating traits come together to form Kathryn Bigelow’s “Strange Days.” Ralph Fiennes plays Lenny Nero, the selfproclaimed “magic man” who runs a black market business selling virtual reality experiences, “playbacks” of anything you might want. Through him, you can be anyone, do anything, whenever you want, as long as someone else did it first and recorded it along the way.
In December 1999, just hours before the year’s end, an outspoken rapper, Jeriko One, is killed, execution style, after being pulled over for a routine traffic stop. The only person in Jeriko’s car who got away was wearing a virtual reality recorder, and we spend the rest of the movie chasing the tape and all of the incriminating evidence on it.
From this point on, we get our required per-movie dose of social commentary. Luckily, in “Strange Days,” the commentary is believable.
A 21st century society - with vigilante justice dished out by the LAPD and racism reaching unprecedented heights - doesn’t seem nearly as far-fetched as it might have five years ago. The Rodney King-like riots could have seemed like clueless shock tactics in a lesser film, but in this one it serves as a warning that our society is headed in a direction we might not like.
Fiennes is impressive as the “magic man.” Although he is depicting a profession that doesn’t yet exist, he does so convincingly and makes the viewer feel true sympathy for him. This is another tricky job for him: He’s the one engaging in illegal activities and selling the latest addictive drug.
But the supporting cast isn’t all that great. Angela Bassett plays a limo driver who loves Lenny and knows (and uses) four martial arts; we never know why she’s there, except for bailing Lenny out several times. Everyone else is either a wacky sci-fi character or an equally wacky ‘50s character out to get our beloved hero.
The best part of this movie is not found in the plot or the acting, but in the frightening implications of the theme. The thought of being able to live someone else’s life for the length of a tape is disturbing. Technology like that could make current “common” addictive drugs obsolete by simply replacing them with something better and much more dangerous. In the film, people are addicted to “playbacks” to the extent that they don’t know real life from mere replications of it.
“Strange Days” ends with two climaxes weird enough to match any part of the movie. They’re also contrived enough to match any part of any movie. The film seems to never quite decide whether it’s a serious commentary on society or a trite science fiction, despite its enjoyable approach.
My recommendation? Go to this movie ready for anything and, if nothing else, you’ll leave with something to think about.
Grade: B