'Brick' review by Jake Boyle
The great Bo Burnham has a joke about phrases that have never been said before, such as "peanut butter tribadism" or "hold my fanny pack while I have sex with this human woman". I'm sure that prior to 2005, the same could have been said of "high school noir". It's not the most obvious choice of genres for a crossover, but Rian Johnson and Joseph Gordon-Levitt's later team-up Looper would prove to be an intuitive and mesmerising event, so I was eager to trace their partnership back to the source.
Brick really does go for the noir with both barrels - it's dark, it's serious, nobody trusts or even particularly likes one another - the only difference is that it's high school students filling in for world-weary gumshoes and gangster's molls. It's played entirely straight-faced, showing you a world full of backstabbing, crime and violence, and it takes a little while to be seriously convincing but once you do buy into it, it's fantastically atmospheric. There is one scene where the mother of a drug dealer is fussing about getting the faux-mobsters orange juice, but mostly the balancing of tone is done by a certain self-aware wryness, such as Richard Roundtree's principal, the spitting image of a disgruntled police chief. There's a few scenes such as these that are very important plot points and wholly serious, but are still made funny by the Johnson's whip-smart semi-pastiche of the genre. The mystery at the centre of the film's narrative was suspenseful, although it comes to a somewhat muddled resolution. The way the story is told though, is smart, with mostly no direct exposition and the audience having to make the connections alongside the protagonist.
Joseph Gordon-Levitt is, predictably, great. His stoic manner and expressions make you forget how young and totally unimposing he looks, and he makes a great demonstration of his range when he shows desperation and pain (more physical than psychological) in the film's later, more emotional moments. The rest of the cast are all on-form, but nobody else particularly jumps out - it's definitely Gordon-Levitt's film. An overacting Brian White does put something of a damper of a proceedings, but he only has a few scenes, so the damage he does to the tone is limited. The whole film is sured up by some sharp cinematography, giving a bleak impression of the world by using wide shots filled with empty space. The jumpy effects used when JG-L gets into fights, repeatedly getting knocked down then standing right back up, were also particularly eye-catching.
All things considered, your enjoyment of Brick is mostly dependant on how seriously you can take its relocation of a classic detective narrative to a high school. It's well-acted, well-written, well-shot, but if you can't buy into the premise of all these teenagers trading stony-faced barbs and engaging in power play over drugs and information, you'll presumably find this film laughably po-faced. I wouldn't know. I really enjoyed it, but I can see a lot of reasons why other people might not.
Joseph Gordon-Levitt is, predictably, great. His stoic manner and expressions make you forget how young and totally unimposing he looks, and he makes a great demonstration of his range when he shows desperation and pain (more physical than psychological) in the film's later, more emotional moments. The rest of the cast are all on-form, but nobody else particularly jumps out - it's definitely Gordon-Levitt's film. An overacting Brian White does put something of a damper of a proceedings, but he only has a few scenes, so the damage he does to the tone is limited. The whole film is sured up by some sharp cinematography, giving a bleak impression of the world by using wide shots filled with empty space. The jumpy effects used when JG-L gets into fights, repeatedly getting knocked down then standing right back up, were also particularly eye-catching.
All things considered, your enjoyment of Brick is mostly dependant on how seriously you can take its relocation of a classic detective narrative to a high school. It's well-acted, well-written, well-shot, but if you can't buy into the premise of all these teenagers trading stony-faced barbs and engaging in power play over drugs and information, you'll presumably find this film laughably po-faced. I wouldn't know. I really enjoyed it, but I can see a lot of reasons why other people might not.
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