Daryl Zero is a private investigator and—along with his assistant, Steve Arlo—he solves impossible crimes and puzzles. Although Daryl's a master investigator, he doesn't know what to do with himself when he's not working; he has no social skills, writes bad music and drives Steve crazy.
19 Sep Zero Effect (1998)
Son of What
There are only a few ways into a story. One of these is to embrace the narrator and carry the viewer through their eyes and the engagement of the world that gives us love. Here, Kasdan does this while referencing Holmes, where this notion of detached observation originates.
There’s an elegant purity to this, and a deliberately less than coherent cinematic approach where different viewing philosophies are mashed together. I need to see ‘Chunking Express’ again.
Reader, if you do not know this, it has a masterful observer in a modern noir role. He starts out in control, and gets entangled with a woman under rigidly noir circumstances. The love is doomed but carries through nonetheless. The only flaw I can see is that we have scant clues about how early our woman discovers Zero’s identity. Someone has engineered this actress’ eyebrows to support her carrying a face that is both open and controlled. I marvel that I have not seen her since.
This is such a perfect path through noir, that I will consider it a candidate for my fours.
Posted in 2022
Ted’s Evaluation — 3 of 3: Worth watching.
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