Brick

The indy movie Brick is an interesting melange of modern movie and film noir. Rian Johnson, the writer and director, set this story in San Clemente, CA at his old high school.

It is a little jolting at first to watch such young actors speaking such out-dated dialog. But once you get past this, the story is smart and intricate.

Brendan, the main character, is a guy with a past. In the classic sense of a Sam Spade, he is troubled and is not a nice guy, but he wants to do right. He gets involved with the story when his former girlfriend, Emily (or “Em”) calls him and asks for help. In his doggedly dependable way, Brendan shoulders this burden and begins to send out feelers to figure out in what she is involved. Soon, she turns up dead and, rather than letting it go, he gets in as deep as it takes to find her killer. On the way he is beaten up, nearly killed, gets in over his head, meets up with a femme fatale and the crime kingpin, and then figures a clever way to turn the tables on all involved.

Johnson uses all the classic film noir techniques. Only those characters important to the story are fully realized; the rest come across as caricatures. The dialog is fast-paced and very stylized. Some very odd camera angles are used. Despite all this, it seems to work. Yet this is juxtaposed against modern cinematography, sharp editing, current music, and today’s fashions.

Nora Zehetner (you might remember her best as the recurring character Laynie on “Everwood”), plays Laura, the femme fatale of the story. While a pretty girl, always needed for this type of role, she also plays her character with a subversive intelligence and a coy smile. She does a fair job of bringing the wit and wiles of a Lauren Bacall to this movie.

Joseph Gordon-Levitt (Tommy Solomon from “3^rd Rock from the Sun”) is generally very good as Brendan. The director obviously wanted him to play the role tense, tough, and unyielding; however, sometimes it felt like it was too tight; a little more emotional may have provoked a bit more attachment to the character. He does get a couple of scenes where the character is allowed to react to all that is going on, and those are very humanizing. Still, the character comes across as smart, capable, and determined.

In many ways, the only film I can think to compare this movie with is the modern retelling of Romeo+Juliet. In that version, young actors in modern settings were using the original dialog from Shakespeare’s play. Daggers and swords were replaced with handguns and uzis. A similar style of modern and classic is mixed in Brick.

One thing that stood out was the fact this film, for all the violence and drugs involved with the plot, had no cursing in it. Most movies with either this subject matter or these types of characters would be chock-full of cursing.

Brick is not for everyone. The stylization of the classic noir and the staccato dialog may turn some viewers off. You definitely need to pay attention and be an active viewer in order to keep up and follow all the clues, or you may get a little lost. However, the movie's originality and slightly odd mix of genres is interesting. If you like to take a bit of chance, you may find this to be a nice gem.

You may enjoy this film if you liked: Donnie Darko, Secretary, Memento