Film Noir - Video Game Style!

Lady in the Lake.


So Philip Marlowe has to solve a murder. Nothing new and there’s been tons of Marlowe movies, what makes this one different? Well this time – YOU get to solve the mystery with him.


This movie is shot completely in the POV of Marlowe. You see ONLY what he sees and hear ONLY what he hears. There isn’t much music in the film either, it’s just his POV for the entire thing. Think Blair Witch Project, but less motion sickness. Apparently Marlowe can keep himself steady better than those other guys.


The positives of this movie are the negatives. The POV is really an interesting technique, you have to really pay attention. When Marlowe reads something, you have to read it too. You even get to drive a car with him! Lots of cool stuff and I really enjoyed the use of the POV.


The only problem with POV is that you never get any other shots of anything or anyone else to draw you in the mystery. If this was a video game, you’d at least get “cut” scenes. Cut scenes take place between the game action so you can see more of the story without your character actually being there.


Here we only get to see Marlowe’s actions, so the mystery isn’t very interesting or difficult to solve. They had to make the mystery simple so that people wouldn’t get confused, but in doing so, there is less suspense.


All in all I still kind of liked the movie. I liked the POV and I think they can improve on the technique to do something better than Cloverfield or Blair Witch. And yes, this movie was better than both of those.


3/5.


J-Man.