Rotting with chronic skin lesions on a hospital bed, pulp author Dan Dark (Robert Downey Jr.) routinely slips into the comforting daydream of detective fiction in which he's a whip-smart, crooning PI. By now, noir-like fractured light, neon signs, and sleazy dives are like catnip to me, but the common setting is a dimly lit studio apartment that specifically references Blue Velvet (a slatted closet door even plays a crucial role). The tone of these reveries is an appealing blend of early Coen brothers—Coen regular Jon Polito is a menacing but buffoonish assassin—and low-key Lynchian absurdity (Downey's lip-synching of '50s pop-jazz standards emits the same gleeful rush as Cage busting out Elvis in Wild at Heart). These fantasies are splintered by a childhood trauma in which little Dan glimpses his mother's indiscretions. As his hallucinations bleed ever inscrutably into reality, he begins seeing an odd psychologist (Mel Gibson) who plunges into Dark's stories to find the root of his discontent. But psychological diagnosis rarely makes for scintillating drama, and the breakthrough spells out what is apparent from Dark's flashbacks. This isn't a crippling development, however, since it illustrates the thematic point about the dangerously alluring, sometimes therapeutic power of art and its value in deciphering the mysteries of the human soul and psyche; but it sure is superfluous. Still, the film is well worth seeing, a provocative mix of stylistic innovation and an unflattering profile of a self-loathing writer who's not as entitled to his bitterness as he initially believes.
Review of The Singing Detective
