UNDER THE SILVER LAKE (2018)

In this self-indulgent homage to ‘80s/’90s L.A. Neo-Noir, rising writer/director David Robert Mitchell hit something of a brick wall with a conspiracy-minded tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing, a film school shaggy dog story filled with naked backsides.  Very nice ones, too, though in true ‘90s style, only the gals are asked to pivot.  Andrew Garfield, his hair never so tousled, is a slacker on his way to getting evicted from one of those L.A. courtyard apartment units, watching his odd neighbors like James Stewart in REAR WINDOW/'54.  (The film poster hangs on the wall.)  But after spending quality time with a new beauty he just saw using the complex’s pool (you know he’s hallucinating as residents never use those pools), she goes missing.  Now Garfield sets off on a trip thru the purgatory of filmdom’s fringe world to find her, picking up on the suggestion of a vast conspiracy hiding in plain sight in codes all around him.  (Just check out the back of that cereal box!)  All tuned to some inner music Mitchell never lets us in on.  At times pretty to look at, and not just the glam, youthful bods, it eventually sorts itself out² via death cult denoument and a special delivery from Mom (a VHS copy of SEVENTH HEAVEN/’27; dir- Frank Borzage; Janet Gaynor; Charles Farrell*).   But this drug-addled paranoid thriller never settles down as a story or even as a time period.  Mitchell now in reset mode.

WATCH THIS, NOT THAT/LINK:  L.A. Noir died briefly in the ‘60s, cracking wise in overlit interiors in films like Paul Newman’s HARPER/’66 & James Garner’s MARLOWE/’69.  At least Blake Edwards caught a whiff of the changing Zeitgeist with his bargain basement GUNN/’67.  But it took Robert Altman pissing everyone off with THE LONG GOODBYE/’73 to revive the genre and find new places to go.  OR:  *Follow up on ‘Mom’s’ suggestion for SEVENTH HEAVEN.  https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2014/12/marlowe-1969.html  https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2019/08/harper-1966.html    https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2020/08/gunn-1967.html  https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2015/03/the-long-goodbye-1973.html