Flick of The Day: Brick

Film Noir is that most stylistic of genres, trading as it does substance and realism for an often rollercoaster ride to the dark side of town. Populated by cynical leading men and a host of seedy underworld characters, it exhibits a bleak view of humanity and arose primarily from the dark underbelly of domestic prosperity in America during the 1940s and 50s. Strictly speaking today's film is Neo-Noir, in that it attempts to recapture the spirit of those films in a modern setting. Brick, written and directed by Rian Johnson, was a big hit at Sundance in 2005.

The film's narrative centers on a hardboiled detective story that takes place in suburbia, specifically that most well travelled of film locations, an American High School. The film draws heavily in plot, characterization, and dialogue from films such as The Big Sleep and The Maltese Falcon. Suspend your disbelief for a moment and take the story at face value and you will quickly get sucked into a gripping ride with a twist finale. Brendan, played by the then rising star Joseph Gordon-Levitt, is the high school loner who has to try and penetrate the upper echelons of the school's social scene and its drug fuelled underbelly when he finds his ex-girlfriend's body in a storm drain, shortly after she made a cryptic call for help.  As always, to find out the true story, you have to watch the film.

This film could so easily have been a train wreck mixing as it does the high school genre and the dark heart of Film Noir however the script is well crafted enough and the leads so obviously enjoying themselves that it pulls it off. As mentioned the film is carried by the performance of its leading man, Jospeh Gordon-Levitt. His character is obviously intelligent, driven by guilt to find out what really happened to the woman he loved. However it's his everyman nature that will keep you caring about what happens to him and his quest for truth.

Shot in only 20 days on a minimal budget by a first time Director, this film punches far above its weight. If you love Noir, you'll love this, filled as it is with shady guys. femme fatales and sharp, pacy dialogue.