Currylingus

Watching 'Brick' is like the visual equivalent of floating in water, to keep yourself up you've got to keep your ears submerged. The result is a strange feeling of being completely alone in your own head while still being able to see as clear as if you were on ground. It is thought-provoking in the sense that you can't stop thinking about it. I went to bed last night mulling the plot details over in my head. 'Brick' is a fully rounded experience in a good old fashioned way. Direction, cinematrography, music, and dialogue all work together to form a film that at once feels both extremely familiar and completely unique. Not too shabby at all for a film that was made for less than $500, 000 and used a high school and its neighboring areas as a set.

I'll just quickly summarize the plot to tantilize the sleuth in you...no spoilers. A detective story with classic "hard-boiled gumshoe" dialogue superimposed on current-day California high schoolers. The fast-talking snoop is played extremely well by Joseph Gordon-Levitt, my new favourite actor. A wild card with a clean slate and the school's assistant VP's ear, he becomes heavily involved in the high school underworld after his sweetheart goes AWOL. This results in the introduction of some very memorable characters, plot twists, and fist fights galore. I was gripping my seat one minute and giggling madly the next...not just because of the hormones, damn you, it's the movie, it's that good.

Allow me to dork out for a bit...I don't know if it was intentional but there were some striking similarities with Twin Peaks (the series). Namely...

1. The shots from below of the ceiling fan with accentuated wooshs, just like the fan in Coop's hotel room before he'd get a vision.

2. The two female leads: one with blonde hair who is confused and led astray and her brunette friend who might not be as good of friend as she makes out.

3. The settings are all real, San Clemente High School is an actual school (the director went there), the "Coffee & Pie" place is real, the tunnel is really behind the school. San Clemente could have its very own pilgrims, just like the Snoqualmie area near Seattle!

For ignorant film noir fans like myself, the best-in-genre only extends to such popular classics as 'Mullholland Drive', 'Blue Velvet', 'Usual Suspects' and even the sci-fi/noir combo 'Blade Runner'. Now I'm adding 'Brick' to that list. There are plans of publishing the script with the original little novella that the flick was based on...I can just hear the 'cult' rumbling with excitement.

Excerpt from the novella, stolen from the excellent website:

"Pin."
"Pin... the Pin?"
"The pin, yeah."
"The pin's kind of a local spook story. You know the Kingpin?" "I've heard it."
"Same thing. Supposed to be old, like 26, lives in town."
"Jake runner, right?"
"Big time...maybe. Ask any dope rat where their junk sprang they'll say they scraped it from that who scored it from this who bought it off so, and after four or five connections the list'll always end with the Pin. But I'll becha you got every rat in town together and said 'show your hands' if any of them've actually seen the Pin, you'd get a crowd of full pockets."

My attendance at last night's showing was courtesy of Ceepee's hard work, thanks fella! Lucas Haas was there, wearing a green suit and white sneaks and looking down right manorexic. He said a few words, sounded like a nice dude. Our eyes met and we both smiled, yessssssss! Made me want to take him home and feed him.