In the near future, the federal government has secretly gotten into the drug business because it gives them (and local police departments) an excuse to do 24/7 surveillance on the entire population. The drug in question is a new one, a powerfully addictive drug called Substance D.
A chain of drug rehab clinics called "NewPath" is exempt from the surveillance. And for good reason: they actually grow, at remote farms, the flower that substance D is made from. These farms are manned exclusively by ex-addicts whose brains have been fried by the drug, so there's no possible breach of the secrecy. It's a perfect closed system.
Drug agents at the local Orange County Police Department have figured out where Substance D is really coming from and have tried and failed to infiltrate the NewPath farms. So they come up with a plan: they will covertly program one of their narcs to bring them back a sample of the Substance D flower, then fry his brains on the drug and get him sent to the farm.
Undercover agents in this future disguise their identity from one another by wearing "scramble suits" (the reason for this is not made clear in the movie; it's because some of the undercover agents may be double agents working for the Substance D agency and hence they need the anonymity).
Bob Arctor (Keanu Reaves) is an undercover narc for the Orange County PD, under the code name "Fred." His superior is a woman named Donna (Winona Ryder), working under the code name "Hank". As part of their plan, Donna assigns "Fred" to do holographic-scanner surveillance on Bob Arctor, ie himself, knowing that this will help speed up his mental deterioration.
Outside the office, Bob believes that Donna is a low-level drug dealer and is buying from her, hoping that she will eventually reveal whom she buys from. He is also smitten with her, and they hang out as if they were a couple, but she is adverse to physical contact. She tells Arctor that this is because she's a coke addict, but in truth, she feels for him deeply, knows she is intentionally destroying him, and couldn't bear to get physically involved with him.
Arctor's roommate, Jim Barris (Robert Downey), is paranoid and unstable and attempts to frame Arctor as a "drug terrorist" for reasons unrelated to the main plot. However, this plays into Donna's hands. Eventually, "Hank" has to admit to "Fred" that "he" knew that "he" was assigning "Fred" to watch himself. "He" tells "Fred" that they were really after Barris all along, but that's just a cover story.
Eventually, Arctor's mind is destroyed, as planned. The destruction mostly takes the form of a growing inability to recognize and differentiate among people. At one point, Arctor picks up a blonde girl and, while in bed, hallucinates that she's Donna. This hallucination is repeated when he plays the scene back on the holographic scanners. (On a metaphorical level, Arctor is seeing into the reality that should have been, where he and Donna would actually be lovers in a perfect world free of evil.) Finally, "Fred" forgets that he's Bob Arctor. Donna takes him to NewPath, and he is eventually sent to a farm.
Ex-Substance D addicts are highly suggestible and ordinarily don't even see the Substance D flowers growing among the corn. But because of Arctor's training, he can see them, and he picks one and puts it in his boot as a gift to take back to his friends at Thanksgiving. The plan has suceeded.
(One of the things that will jump out at you on a second viewing is the way they program Arctor with suggestions of giving Donna a blue flower, or giving his friends a gift.)
8/10- Overly talkative and badly paced, the film is nevertheless one of a kind. A unique, psychedelic, sci-fi drug movie, the film perfectly captures the tone of P. K. Dick.
Worth 2 viewings.
A chain of drug rehab clinics called "NewPath" is exempt from the surveillance. And for good reason: they actually grow, at remote farms, the flower that substance D is made from. These farms are manned exclusively by ex-addicts whose brains have been fried by the drug, so there's no possible breach of the secrecy. It's a perfect closed system.
Drug agents at the local Orange County Police Department have figured out where Substance D is really coming from and have tried and failed to infiltrate the NewPath farms. So they come up with a plan: they will covertly program one of their narcs to bring them back a sample of the Substance D flower, then fry his brains on the drug and get him sent to the farm.
Undercover agents in this future disguise their identity from one another by wearing "scramble suits" (the reason for this is not made clear in the movie; it's because some of the undercover agents may be double agents working for the Substance D agency and hence they need the anonymity).
Bob Arctor (Keanu Reaves) is an undercover narc for the Orange County PD, under the code name "Fred." His superior is a woman named Donna (Winona Ryder), working under the code name "Hank". As part of their plan, Donna assigns "Fred" to do holographic-scanner surveillance on Bob Arctor, ie himself, knowing that this will help speed up his mental deterioration.
Outside the office, Bob believes that Donna is a low-level drug dealer and is buying from her, hoping that she will eventually reveal whom she buys from. He is also smitten with her, and they hang out as if they were a couple, but she is adverse to physical contact. She tells Arctor that this is because she's a coke addict, but in truth, she feels for him deeply, knows she is intentionally destroying him, and couldn't bear to get physically involved with him.
Arctor's roommate, Jim Barris (Robert Downey), is paranoid and unstable and attempts to frame Arctor as a "drug terrorist" for reasons unrelated to the main plot. However, this plays into Donna's hands. Eventually, "Hank" has to admit to "Fred" that "he" knew that "he" was assigning "Fred" to watch himself. "He" tells "Fred" that they were really after Barris all along, but that's just a cover story.
Eventually, Arctor's mind is destroyed, as planned. The destruction mostly takes the form of a growing inability to recognize and differentiate among people. At one point, Arctor picks up a blonde girl and, while in bed, hallucinates that she's Donna. This hallucination is repeated when he plays the scene back on the holographic scanners. (On a metaphorical level, Arctor is seeing into the reality that should have been, where he and Donna would actually be lovers in a perfect world free of evil.) Finally, "Fred" forgets that he's Bob Arctor. Donna takes him to NewPath, and he is eventually sent to a farm.
Ex-Substance D addicts are highly suggestible and ordinarily don't even see the Substance D flowers growing among the corn. But because of Arctor's training, he can see them, and he picks one and puts it in his boot as a gift to take back to his friends at Thanksgiving. The plan has suceeded.
(One of the things that will jump out at you on a second viewing is the way they program Arctor with suggestions of giving Donna a blue flower, or giving his friends a gift.)
8/10- Overly talkative and badly paced, the film is nevertheless one of a kind. A unique, psychedelic, sci-fi drug movie, the film perfectly captures the tone of P. K. Dick.
Worth 2 viewings.