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The Black Dahlia.

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The Black Dahlia

Produced by Rudy Cohen, Mosche Diamant, Art Linson, directed by Brian De Palma; screenplay by Josh Friedman, based on a novel by James Ellroy; cinematography by Vilmos Zsigmond; production design by Dante Ferretti; edited by Bill Pankow; costumes by Jenny Beavan; original music by Mark Isham, starring Josh Hartnett, Scarlett Johansson, Aaron Eckhart, Hilary Swank, Mia Kirshner, Mike Starr, Fiona Shaw, Patrick Fischler, James Otis and John Kavanagh. Color, 121 mins. A Universal Pictures release.

That Old-School cineaste Brian De Palma still believes in a politics/film connection. His latest feature The Black Dahlia, about the 1947 murder of Elizabeth Short, a starlet in post-WWII Hollywood, can be called a thriller for its quantities of violence, sex, and paranoia. But it is wrong to simplify the movie as a modern film noir. De Palma's sensitivity to the politics/film connection explodes what people think of as the noir genre. He soft-pedals 'suspense' because he isn't interested in recreating the lazy nostalgia and immoral tension of such typical Hollywood noirs as L.A. Confidential and Hollywoodland. Rather, The Black Dahlia is De Palma-personal; a consideration of the price paid by folks who live in the Hollywood environment either by working within the filmmaking industry or under the sway of movie mythology.

De Palma upsets genre expectations by refusing to satisfy the prurient element of movie star insider gossip. Call it a genre dismantling, because the major characters are Hollywood outsiders: policemen Bucky (Josh Harnett) and Lee (Aaron Eckhart); career girl Kay (Scarlett Johansson); socialite Madeleine (Hilary Swank); and, of course, the most tragic outsider, Elizabeth Smart. These figures are ideal for examining the politics of Hollywood myth and culture. If you anticipate another sun-and-rot police procedural, stick with the facile Curtis Hanson. De Palma expects audiences to be as intoxicated--yet appalled--by lore and lust as he is. He shows the political economics of the place by examining the way the cops perform, the civilians subsist, the ruling class rules, and the anonymous besotted dreamers get crushed.

Moviegoers confronting this strangely convoluted tale need to understand the background of De Palma's art and the movie fascination that led inevitably to The Black Dahlia. As a young film enthusiast in the 1960's,...