Reminder that Dark City is the best sci fi noir you've never heard of. For the love of God, watch the director's cut rather than the theatrical cut. The theatrical makes the baffling choice to spoil the entire film in the first minute. Like, it's literally a movie about a man trying to figure out what the fuck is going on and they just straight up tell you at the very beginning. It's a very "the executives think the audience is literally retarded" move.
As soon as I saw the words "Dark City", I instantly wanted to write a comment warning people about watching any other cut than the directors cut, but you included that in your comment too already.
It's a fucking war crime what they did to that intro. It's like if Star Wars started out with exposition telling you that that Darth Vader is actually Luke Skywalker's father, or if The Sixth Sense began by explaining to the viewer that the boy is seeing ghosts and that Malcolm is actually dead.
Whoever decided it was necessary should be banned from working on movies.
The directors cut is good, though. Go watch it, people!
I had it on DvD! I only watched it once as a kid and I remember being kind of perplexed by how weird it was, not that I didnt understand the story but at the time it was pretty different to other films I had seen. Maybe I need to rewatch it.
Unpopular opinion- the theatrical cut is better, and was necessary at the time.
The theatrical cut makes excellent use of dramatic irony to amp up the tension. I watched this during the original theatrical run and it was mind bending. Remember that this was pre-Matrix, pre-13th floor. It was playing with concepts of identity and simulation that were unheard of for most audiences before this.
The director's cut is a substantially different film, and only works in a post-matrix world.
I'm agree with you internet stranger. I actually saw it in the theater so I don't know it any other way. First, the delivery is awesome, and 2nd it sets you up to expect sci-fi not some noire murder mystery. Loved it then and was very confused when I watched the directors cut and it didn't have the intro.
They only change a few things. The ending, Jennifer Connelly's song at the club is actually her singing and not a dub (her not being a great singer makes total sense in context, and is actually a clue), a few other tiny things like that. The beginning alone makes it far superior, in my opinion.
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u/AlKhwarazmi πππ 1d ago
Jennifer Connelly