"Dark City." The title sends chills down my spine. Not to be mean to the men and women who devoted six months of their lives to this production, but this was a bad, bad movie. Siskel and Ebert somehow gave it two thumbs up, Ebert gave it four stars in his Chicago Sun-Times column, but this opinion is coming from the common man. My exact quote to my friends coming out of the film was, "This is the worst movie I have ever seen. No, I take that back, 'Rookie of the Year' was worse. This is the second worst movie I have ever seen. But at least I saw 'Rookie of the Year' for free."

I admit, I am no big science-fiction fan. That isn't a crime. I'd watch a gangster flick or a slapstick comedy over "Star Trek," so this might not match the opinions of someone who has seen the "Highlander" 11 times.

The overall story of "Dark City" is somewhat intriguing. An entire city of humans is trapped under the control of an endangered species of aliens, only they don't know it. Every night, the aliens (or "strangers") freeze time, and replace everyone's memories with their own concoctions to perform their experiment. Cute. Not as straightforward as Luke Skywalker fighting the embodiment of evil or Captain Kirk exploring the universe, but there is an understandable, interesting plot.

The acting was at times competent, at times even bordering on good for some cast members, but on the whole it didn't take your breath away. The totally unnecessary film noir persona of the film emphasized the underexpression and staid personalities, but to see Jennifer Connelly not change her facial expression for 90 minutes was kind of annoying. Our hero, Mr. Murdoch, played by Rufus Sewell, probably is the best performance, actually responding emotionally to the events around him. Kiefer Sutherland does a mediocre job with the required mad scientist role, and the villains do sell their freakish characters. But the supporting cast, namely Connelly as Murdoch's wife Emma, and William Hurt as Inspector Bumstead are pretty awful. It's obvious that Hurt was convinced that wearing a trenchcoat in a dimly lit film makes him the new Bogart. Um, no. You have to be a decent actor to accomplish that. Like Connelly, a mudpack on Hurt's face would not have been disturbed at all by his acting in the movie.

Much of the laughability of the movie arises from the overdone and pretty much unnecessary use of the overexploited film noir genre. Just because a detail in the plot leaves the city unlit, hence the title, it does not mean that everyone has to wear trenchcoats and fedoras, the streets have to be constantly damp and drizzly, and the buildings have to come right out of Brooklyn's Brownsville of the 1930s. Putting some creativity into costumes and scenery isn't a crime. The participation of Alex Proyas, the film's director, was quite obvious. Proyas' magnum opus up to this point is "The Crow," starring Brandon Lee, and less the details, the costuming and scenery is identical. Even the machines that produce the omnipresent moisture in the air is set on the same level.

Another downfall of the film is the fishnet of details. From the audience's perspective, certain details seem to diffuse out without being resolved, while others are introduced with little reason in the middle of the movie. For instance, exactly what superpowers did Murdoch have? He could create a door in the middle of a wall and equal the powers of the most powerful sorcerer in the city, but he couldn't go down the canal any faster that the paddles could take him? What the dealio? And the evil Strangers can fly, but if they fall off of a building they tumble to their deaths. If I recall, Superman could fly just as well if he was in the air by accident as when he took off on purpose. Just my two cents on the subject of aviation.

Perhaps the silliest part of the flick was the resolution. The conquest of good over evil results in one visible change. In the words of a friend of mine, "So, the Dark City is now just a city surrounded by a moat." Give New Jersey a beautiful Atlantic City coastline, but it is still New Jersey. Just because it now has a beach and an ocean doesn't change the fact that the city is a slab of concrete and piping that looks like the surface of a neglected Death Star.

The bottom line is that the most crucial aspect of any film--the plot--was not bad. It is the pieces that support the plot, namely the acting, the costumes, the dialogue, the detailing, the resolution, the scenery, etc., etc., was not good, and downright bad at times. Even having looked back with 20/20 hindsight upon the unfortunate episode which cost me $4.75 and a Friday afternoon, my initial labeling of "Dark City" as one of bigger wastes of Hollywood money I have ever seen is still poignant in my eyes. This is just not a very good movie. I'm sure if Spielberg or Orson Welles had done it, it would have been legendary. Unfortunately, not every film can be carried by a big name genius behind the curtain. Some actually need to have mere mortals attempt to make it watchable. The cast, the writers, and especially Proyas dropped the ball. No sale. I'll take pity upon New Line Cinema for spending a coupla billion on the project, and give "Dark City" 1/47th of a star.