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Anybody expecting to get a great account of the Black Dahlia case, even fictional, will be disappointed going in to this movie. Of course, I knew that it was a fictionalization of the case, but I had no idea the movie would present its own evidence and draw its own conclusions.

But the main problem here is not the lack of factual detail, so much as the confusion of plot that surrounds and overwhelms the Black Dahlia case itself. So much plot and character and sideplots and backstory are built around the central characters that the case itself seems like a distraction. A key plot point and character motivator is the fascination of the two detectives with the murder, but this is never elaborated enough in the film, and we're left to half-heartedly guess at the character motivations.

The tone is never consistently campy, but when the camp arrives it overwhelms the story. A dinner scene between a suspect and her family had the crowd in stitches (the only scene during which the audience laughed). The problem is that the scene is valuable to the plot and should never have been played for laughs. Hitchcock or even Lynch could have shot the same scene, with the same events and dialogue, and made it menacing and creepy, which it needed to be to function in the mystery.

Other problems: De Palma uses the lesbian angle of the movie (never a part of the case) to full exploitative advantage, and the actresses seem unable to master to the expressive 1940s style acting that would have come naturally to even a marginal 40s star.

Although the film brings a clearcut finale rather than a vague puzzle, too many loose threads come together too neatly and rather than bringing the film to a satisfactory conclusion, it leaves you scratching your head, is this what I spent the last 2 hours waiting to hear? Overall, there is too much plot, too little character development and a wildly uneven tone. The movie has its moments but it's a blinding mess all together.

It has been almost ten years since Curtis Hanson delivered what was arguably the best picture of 1997, L.A. Confidential. That movie was great in almost every way (my key dislike was only in the performance of Kim Basinger, yet the Academy did not agree with me), and a big part of that was due to the source material from James Ellroy. And now comes The Black Dahlia, another one of Ellroy's books based on detectives in the 1940's, only revolving around a real event and having master filmmaker Brian De Palma at the helm. And unfortunately, the film comes with mixed results.

After taking part in a boxing match which ends up giving a whole lot more power to the L.A.P.D., Dwight "Bucky" Bleichert (Josh Hartnett) and Leland "Lee" Blanchard (Aaron Eckhart) are promoted to detectives and become partners. Shortly afterwards, they become entangled in the brutal murder of Elizabeth Short (Mia Kirshner), otherwise known as the titular Black Dahlia. What follows for them is a tale of corruption, greed and vengeance. It may not seem like much (not too mention the femme fatales of Scarlett Johansson and Hilary Swank), but the film really has a lot going on.

And this is where a bit of the problems lie.

Some of the events that occur over the course of the film, are just completely random and almost unexplainable. Hell, random subplots appear and disappear faster than they come up. When it really starts getting down to business, the movie becomes downright confusing, and the narrative does not let up for anyone to truly figure it all out. It gets especially bizarre in the final act, when almost nothing truly makes sense, and we just have to sit and just contend with what ends up happening. It makes it seem like they want the audience to sift through and determine what is relevant to the film and what is not, and only then can they truly grasp onto a full understanding. Even after watching the film a few hours ago, I still question some of the things that happened.

I think one of the key reasons it does not make a whole whack of sense is the fact that it revolves around a real event. Last week's Hollywoodland had this same problem in that the filmmakers do not seem to have an idea of where to draw your attention. Do they want the focus on the murder itself, or do they want the focus on the cops investigating it? Adding in a few seemingly bizarre backstories does not help this either. They seem to strike gold when they focalize on what the murder and its impending investigation is doing to Bucky and Lee, but they do not spend enough time expressing it. They touch on it in passing, and instead, cut to either useless items, or completely random things. You can tell that there is some form of direction however, just not enough.

Hartnett plays Bucky very smoothly, and does a very adequate job in his narration. He really lacks the zest to make his character interesting however, and has a really tough time trying to make the audience care about him. He just does not seem to have the hard-boiled cop schtick nailed down here, and only comes off as a little less than soft-boiled. Eckhart on the other hand, does have the zest and really shines through as Lee. His character goes through most of the changing during the film, and you can see the dramatic change of character as the film progresses. He just does not have nearly enough screen time to truly flesh him from being the strange and mysterious character.

Johansson does well for herself as the girl stuck between the two partners, and only sparingly gets the opportunity to stretch out her enigmatic character. Swank on the other hand, feels completely useless in the scheme of things (until her character actually serves a purpose later in the film). Her disappear/reappearing Scottish accent is laughable, and her whole performance really begs the question of how she has managed to snag two Best Actress Oscars in less than ten years. Supporting work, especially from Mike Starr, Fiona Shaw and the flashback heavy Kirshner, are all on the mark and are fairly well done in their limited roles.

Whereas there were problems with many other things, there are none with the sets, costumes and cinematography. This is 1940's Los Angeles, and it looks gorgeous. Every single minute detail seems to have been polished and amped up to the point of looking like it was filmed sixty years ago. It makes the film feel more realistic than it is, and makes the sheer "coolness" of the settings and characters stand right out. Although it may be advertised as being noir, it really is nowhere near as dark as it could have been. Yet, it still has enough packed into it to make this film visually astonishing.

Another standout is the feel of it being a De Palma film. The camera angles, the slow motion, the violence, the sheer editing of it all (especially the worn black and white film clips of Kirshner as Short), just screams old school De Palma. From the start, even with its problems, the audience knows it is in the hands of a style master, and in that regard, the film is consistent and on the mark.

But unfortunately, that same phrase cannot be used to describe the rest of the film. It is truly a mixed bag, but despite its confusing narrative, it is still interesting and stylish as hell. But I still cannot help but be disappointed overall. I guess I was just expecting a whole lot more.

7/10.

Dante Ferretti's set design beautifully evokes the 1940's; Vilmos Zsigmond's cinematography enhances the period look; and the voice-over narration has been pulled from film-noir classics. While Brian De Palma's "The Black Dahlia" has much of the look and feel of Curtis Hanson's 1997 "L.A. Confidential," that far superior film boasted better performances and a well-written screenplay. Although both films were based on James Ellroy novels and both had complicated, involved plots, the Hanson film came together with satisfying logic. Unfortunately, De Palma's movie is equally if not more complex and leaves a few threads dangling or at least badly frayed.

Although loosely based on a famous Hollywood murder, "The Black Dahlia" spends more time than necessary in establishing the three-way partnership, if not ménage, between Josh Hartnett, Scarlett Johansson, and Aaron Eckhart. The leisurely pace allows viewers to ponder the last time that they saw a film with so many double letters in the stars' names. The trailer, which has played in theaters for weeks, was misleading, and the actual murder and resulting investigation do not begin until well into the film after we have witnessed boxing scenes between the police investigators, Hartnett and Eckhart, and some three-way flirtations that do little to advance the proceedings.

The film only becomes interesting when the campy upper crust Linscott family enters. Hilary Swank as Madeleine Linscott is a deadly femme in black and as fatale as they come. Fiona Shaw as her mother shamelessly steals scenes and chews the banisters in her few minutes on screen, and John Kavanagh as Emmet Linscott adds to the family's quirky personality. An entire film could have been constructed around the Linscotts that would have been far more interesting than the Hartnett-Johansson-Eckhart romance. Scarlett has little to do but purse her luscious red lips and look desirable in tight blouses, which she does quite well. Josh is all squinty-eyed intensity and muscled charm, which he does quite well. Aaron tries for more, but goes a bit over the top; perhaps he would have been more comfortable playing a cousin of the Linscotts.

Although "The Black Dahlia" is not the worst way to spend two hours, the film's pedigree would lead viewers to expect more. Only a week after the less-disappointing "Hollywoodland," De Palma's take on another old Hollywood mystery should have been riveting. All of the essentials were there, except possibly a seasoned troop of stars, for another "L.A. Confidential." Unfortunately, what arrived was a nearly indecipherable mystery within a tedious love triangle that was wrapped in multi-million dollar production values.

"For murder, though it have no tongue, will speak/With most miraculous organ." Shakespeare's Hamlet

Murders are messy on the screen and in real life; screenplays about them can be chaotic and disjointed also. Such is the case with Black Dahlia, a film noir from Brian De Palma, a past master of the macabre and the complicated (Blow Out, Body Double). It has all the trappings of a first-rate detective novel (James Ellroy) made into a 1940's thriller with appropriately moody music of the soulful trumpet (Mark Isham), lush production design (Dante Ferretti), and equally impressive costuming (Jenny Beavan), all set in a timelessly seedy Los Angeles.

There's also the conflicted, sometimes dark hero detective (Josh Hartnett) and the sexy, dangerous femme fatale (Hilary Swank), accompanied by the questionably good voluptuary sex bomb (Scarlett Johansson). As if these noir troublemakers were not enough, writer Josh Friedman seemingly adapts Ellroy's every subplot, every story thread, as if each had to be accounted for in the best CSI tradition.

The original novel was based on aspiring actress Elizabeth Short's unsolved grizzly murder in 1947. After a considerably convoluted exposition, with plot lines rarely intersecting in a unified way, the film has the nerve to offer one of the most extensive denouements in film history, could be a half hour, with lengthy explanation of how all those ends tied together. Needless to say, anti climaxes abound in this last segment, leaving not only more confusion about the plot but also a desire to get back to The Big Sleep without sleeping, a state Black Dahlia threatened several times.

Hartnett's detective says, "Nothing stays buried forever. Nothing." I say this weak noir wannabe should stay buried until a bright 22nd century scholar sees its cultural and aesthetic significance. Until then, it's a jumble of plot points resolved in the end by tedious narration. Even Scarlett Johansson's pulchritude couldn't win me, and that's murder in the first degree.

Fictional movie based on a real unsolved Hollywood murder in the 1940s. The mutilated body of Elizabeth Short (Mia Kirschner) is found in an empty lot. Officer Dwight Bleichert (Josh Harnett) and Sgt. Leland Blanchard (Aaron Eckhart) are assigned to the case. Blanchard becomes obsessed with the case causing troubles with his girlfriend Kay Lake (Scarlett Johansson). She then falls for Bleichert. Then there are more murders and lesbians and incest are thrown in...

The plot is a little too convoluted but so was the book (by Jack Ellroy). To be totally honest I can't understand why this is getting blasted by the critics. It's no masterpiece but it's 100 times better than director Brian DePalma's last film (2002's terrible "Femme Fatale") and probably his best work since 1996's "Mission Impossible". The 1940s setting is beautifully captured with clothes and settings--this film really looks great. DePalma once again gives us some incredible visual sequences--one murder is downright terrifying and one of the best things he's done in years. Also the plot, while involved, does reach a logical, satisfying conclusion. However the film isn't perfect.

There's a lesbian bar here that's really overdone. It's beautiful, with a ridiculously elaborate stage show--but in 1940s Hollywood? I don't think so. The acting is all over the place. Eckhart OVERACTS to a ridiculous degree. Hartnett is terrible (no surprise there) but so are Johansson and Hilary Swank (both wonderful actresses). It seems like Harnett's presence bring them down to his level of non acting. Last, and least, is English actress Fiona Lewis who is certainly acting but not in this picture. She overdoes it so much she makes Eckhart look restrained.

So I DID like it but with a tighter story and a better leading man this might have been great. As it stands it's a very good, well-made movie with some questionable acting. I give it a 7.

I read these reviews before seeing the picture, and really expected a bomb. Maybe it was my low expectations, but I thought the movie acquitted itself of being a "wait for the DVD" review. First, don't go with the expectation of seeing a murder mystery, this is not about tracking down bad guys and solving a crime. This is a movie about relationships. You best be aware at the get-go about paying attention to the dialog in order to understand what is going on. The low point came when Rose McGowan was interviewed by one cop and looked more like an old imitation of of her TV Charmed role. The problem is that what she says sets up the rest of the movie. If you dismiss her delivery without paying attention to what she says, you can quickly get lost and frustrated. In fact, the movie requires the viewer to be an active listener of all the dialog in order to understand what's going on...If you are into passive entertainment, go to another movie. The movie does have a lot of holes and weak points. Hillary Swank's accent comes in and out at odd times. One cop beats up a main character in one scene, and he returns without a scratch in the next scene. Scarlett Johanson is a poor man's Kim Bassinger from L.A. Confidental, but she still exudes a passable sexual aura.

In spite of these shortcomings, the late 40s style of the movie captures the time better than any other work I've seen. The two police buddies give very credible performances. The storyline is smart and DePalma does tie everything up in the end. The dinner at Hillary Swank's house is worth the price of admission. I howled out loud when the mother discussed her obligations at the table. In L.A. Confidential, you had an almost perfect blend of action keeping pace with the dialog and acting. This movie is more uneven in its balance, but still delivers credible entertainment

Brian De Palma's so called "film noir" has all the aspects of a great film: detectives, guns, murder, a beautiful blonde, an Oscar winning brunette, and a boxing match. It involves violence, money, pimps, porn, and "the most notorious murder in California history". Sadly though, the movie just doesn't cut it.

The Black Dahlia isn't about murder, or guns, or pimps or porn. The Black Dahlia is about the new American dream: to sleep with Scarlett Johansson. The Dahlia isn't even introduced until a third of the movie is over, the longest 45 minutes I've ever experienced in cinema. A good hour of the movie doesn't have anything to do with the plot, and watching it is just like watching paint dry. Much of this wasted screen time is attributed to the relationship between Sgt. Leland "Lee" Blanchard (Aaron Eckert) and Officer. Dwight "Bucky" Bleichert (Josh Hartnett), where we see their transformation from enemies to partners to friends unrealistically fast, which is unrealistically cliché.

But the biggest downside of the movie is Josh Hartnett. What Hartnett is doing as a serious actor is beyond me, but his performance is a wooden as they come. It is unbelievable that he was considered for the role of Bleichert, and the fact that he was cast really makes me lose faith in Hollywood's mainstream actors. His noir-ish voice-over was like reading words off the script, making it feel less and less like the artsy film De Palma intended it to be.

The only redeeming feature of the flick was Mia Kirshner who had about one minute of screen time as the Dahlia, but was the most memorable character. Oh, yeah, and we do get to see Hilary Swank's ass.

But overall, The Black Dahlia is just another bad film to cap off the summer. It is extremely confusing with all its pointless sub-plots, and just gets annoying at the end. It's one of those movies you consider walking out of, and I counted down the minutes to what I thought would be a climactic finale, but was just a series of long monologues and unclear speaking. In the end, we learned little about the Dahlia, and were pretty much back where we started, except for a few missing comrades.

How many producers does it take to screw up a movie? In the case of The Black Dahlia it takes 21 "producers". I counted the credits to be sure. I guess all 21 producers didn't notice how phony the flame bars were in the opening fire scene. The only producer with any real credits is Art Linson. Perhaps what this film needed was a single producer, director, writer team that could focus on the story. And how about that acting? Johanson was miscast as was Swank (although Swank is generally a good actress in other films). The plot is convoluted beyond anyones general concept of the Black Dahlia story. I was told that this film was a real disappointment by my friends who saw it in a theatre, so I watched it on DVD and almost walked out of my own living room. On the positive side, the photography, production design and the music were acceptable. But is it just me or does most of the dialog sound like clichés from other film noir films? As others have pointed out this wanted to be L.A. Confidential or Chinatown, but came off as a poor imitation. To bad as I really wanted to love it...

Having read so many negative reviews, I started doubting my own rating for a minute, but no, I will rate this above average. It may not much for people knowing what the Black Dahlia murders were all about or that read the book, but for a movie, it was good.

The film has the feel of L.A. Confidential (but it's not that good) or maybe more like Where the Truth Lies and is beautifully shot. The story itself is somehow convoluted, but it all becomes somewhat clearer in the end. Yes, the plot does have some holes in it and some acting is not so convincing as it should be, but saying Josh Hartnett didn't act is just lame. He plays a less emotional person than others and he was very well cast for the role. Some of the script scenes were weak, that's one thing an actor can't change.

Bottom line: watch it in a slow night, when you feel like seeing a movie that removes you from everyday life. This is not exactly a noir film, but it's close enough.

Synapses didn't quite connect. Lovely and stylish looks. Something missing. Left me hungry.

Pretty film. Gorgeous styling, not just evoking, but recreating a noir genre and capturing an honest, studied essence of the Los Angeles of yore. Interesting, but the film captures Los Angeles more than 'Hollywood'; but at its core, we found that there was something essentially lacking in the composition of characters we are introduced to in this flick.

After much consideration, we've determined that while de Palma fans will love this picture, we found that in the end there was no redemption. All the loose threads tie up, but there is no sympathetic character, we don't care about anyone, and there is no overwhelming humanity we were able to relate to in any single character's story.

So we left the screening thinking yeah? Right? That was it? Since we didn't read the novel, we're not sure whether the film was true to it or not, but while the iconic Black Dahlia story is an enduring Hollywood mystery, it's somewhat secondary, symbolic and iconic in terms of its position in this film's story.

One great performance: Fiona Shaw as the rich man's wife. Genius. And Hillary Swank ain't half-bad as the femme fatale. But at the end of the day we found Josh Hartnett about 5 years too young for us to completely buy his story. We felt that he just didn't bring enough maturity to the table. Scarlett J. provides her standard issue intelligent-but-somehow- flatlining-blonde aesthetic, she's stunning as usual.

The art direction and color tones of this film were the stars as far as we were concerned. This film is totally artful, but still left us hungry. Not bad, but gosh darn, coulda been better. Ya know?

Now I like Brian DePalma, and I love Carrie, The Untouchables and Carlito's Way. Out of the films of his I've seen, The Black Dahlia is my least favourite in my view, though I was also rather disappointed in Scarface too.

I was really interested in its concept and the story seemed interesting. Also the film is very well made, with stylish cinematography and beautiful scenery, costumes, sets and makeup, DePalma's direction has occasional flashes of brilliance and the music was quite nice as well.

However, this is another case of style over substance. The script falls flat, with little idea of which direction to go, and the tone of the story is also uneven with some scenes disappointingly over-the top. The characters I felt indifferent to, and I also thought they were quite shallow and poorly explored, the pace is rather meandering and with exception of Fiona Shaw who's quite good the acting is bland. Also the ending I think is overdone.

All in all, interesting initially and while well made it is emotionally hollow and flat in its scripting and characterisation. 4/10 Bethany Cox

Have you ever been with a master storyteller who is hot? I mean in person. Its an absolutely captivating thing, watching the craft of captivating you. Its a worthy experience, even when the story isn't good. In fact, its even better when they story isn't good. You might wonder for a while why such a talented teller would choose the material she has, but will fade as you fall under spell of the storyteller, undistracted by the story. It you are lucky, she'll be a hand dancer and you will simply allow your soul to move with the undermusic.

dePalma never bothers me when he chooses bad actors, stories and such. Its just not relevant to what he has to offer, and in fact sometimes I'm thankful that the story itself doesn't get in the way. "Mission to Mars" was rewarmed tacos, but the fact that it was served by a metaphoric, genuine Spanish grandmother from her own hands was all that mattered.

About 22 minutes into this there is a wonderful crane shot, probably done without artificial assistance, beginning five minutes which is the heart of the overly complex story. It sets up two apparently unrelated threads in the story that interweave from this point. It is of the front of a building where later there will be a shooting, moves up and over the building to look at a vacant lot behind where we see a woman making a gruesome discovery. She runs to the street alongside the building where we see the car of our two cops coming to park in front and engage in a shooting. We move in front of the car to a bicyclist, who plays no role in the story. He brings us to a couple walking down the sidewalk approaching the front of the building where they will encounter our cops. We come down to street height and listen in on their conversation.

Its masterful. Even if you think everything that follows is a mess, its a glorious mess made glorious by our setting of the knitting needles.

This, my friends, is what noir is about these days: establishing an eye of god who both is us and who perturbs nature to suit conventions of coincidence in storytelling.

But there's another joy here too. The story — no surprise — features a film within the film. Its the whole story, there, with elements of that internal film overlapping the main story in three or four significant ways. The star of this inner film, who also is our bisected victim is a character played by Mia Kirshner. She's so much more alive and real than anyone else in the main story, I can only assume it was deliberate and a truly thrilling risk. If you follow film, you'll know her very similar and hugely complex role in "Exotica," a landmark film.

Two major experiences in a film! Of course its worth watching!

Ted's Evaluation -- 3 of 3: Worth watching.

Two detectives are put on the case of the Black Dahlia murder. While tracking down the killer as partners, they also must face each other as rivals for the woman they both love.

The marketing for this film was misleading, let me say that first of all. The film appeared to be something like a horror film in the trailers, but really has no horror elements at all (despite the grotesque murder of Betty Short). Furthermore, the assumption is that the film would be about the Black Dahlia (with a title like "The Black Dahlia) but this was really a background issue to the romance storyline.

It could have been a horror film, but wasn't. As my friend Trixie said, it was "one Chinaman short of a horror film." You take that to mean whatever you choose.

The creative forces behind this are some of the best. Directed by Brian dePalma ("Scarface", "Untouchables", "Carrie", and the Courtney Cox favorite "Dancing in the Dark") and written by James Ellroy ("LA Confidential"). I'm not a biog enough follower of dePalma to really pinpoint his stylistic work in this, but Ellroy's work is clear: like "La Confidential", there are multiple layers of storyline, and you're not likely to get everything in the first viewing.

Ellroy's intricacies were actually my biggest problem with the film. For a city as large as Los Angeles, there seem to be a surprisingly small amount of people who do anything in this film, and things are more interconnected than one would imagine. How are murder, real estate, film-making and child molesting connected? You'll find out by the end of this one...

But, if I suspend my beliefs, this is a beautiful work of art. The acting is great, the directing wonderful. The lighting is the best, giving the film a gritty, back alley appearance... the world of pimps and gangs like one would imagine it to be.

Scarlett Johannsen was very good, though I don't know if she was the right one for this role. Josh Hartnett, in contrast, was perfect. A few years ago I would have said he would never amount to anything beyond a pretty boy, but this film says otherwise: he is a strong lead and carries the full maturity and seriousness of a seasoned actor. (While retaining those looks for the ladies.) The film is a bit slower than most, as there is much to digest in the short time we have to feast upon it. But if you are patient and perceptive, this is the film for you. (If you need constant stimulation, you'll fall asleep.) Give me a second viewing, and I might even give the film an 8. (My opinion was skewed in that I didn't know the proper mindset with which to enter the film.)

This aged pretty well. Having just read the book, it's nice to see verbatim dialogue lifted, mostly delivered well. Of course, this truncated the plot significantly. I feel like the rhythm of the work is lost too, but this is a translation, so that's to be expected. I thought I'd find Sorkin-like dialogue actually, but this is more of a satire of the aesthetic and noir sensibility than leaning into the high competency of the character that would signal. They're staggering through life; certainly through their jobs.

Had the actors had a bit more chops and the screen time been increased to allow for some breathing time, this might have been a really great film. For one, Hillary Swank might have the best performance I've seen of her here, somehow. There's an excellent first person scene with our boy meeting the parents. It's got things going for it. I do wish it was a bit more pervasive. But I did just read the book, which is very well written, so.

Brace yourself for some real truth. As you noticed on IMDb, this movie was advertised as "Crime / Drama / Mystery / Thriller". The trailer makes the movie look the same. Unfortunately, if you go to this movie with that in mind, you may and should be disappointed. When I see the genre described as it was, I want to see just that. Oh, you can add comic relief, maybe good music, some reasonable horror and nostalgia, but do not do what was done to The Black Dahlia.

They obviously didn't intend to make this a serious movie, but rather it was a cheap attempt to imitate a Film Noir sometimes, a TV mystery sometimes and then other times I don't think they knew what they actually wanted to do.

When I am sucked into a movie that I believe is going to be a mystery, I want to be able to enjoy the movie throughout and get involved in the mystery. In this case, the viewer has to spend far too much time trying to figure out what the movie is trying to do. Just give me the mystery that the movie is about. No one needs to make the movie-making process a mystery.

For those of you who are going just to see Scarlett Johansson, I have to say I am very disappointed in her. Her acting needs a lot of improvement or she needs to find movies that embrace her sensuality. Yeah, she is sexy in this movie, too, but her voice does not fit her actions and her acting is puzzling, not mysterious. I want the Scarlett I knew from "Lost In Translation" and "American Rhapsody" at least she could act and her voice fit her character. Other main characters were just as puzzling, however. And honestly, the best and most interesting characters were treated somewhat like extras, though one of those "extras" was by far the best actress in the movie.

You can call this an imitation Film Noir Graphic Novel that should have taken a more serious approach to even those genres.

I gave it a 4 out of 10 out of generosity.

Yes, all of it and more. The images are beautiful but what a mess. I don't need to understand what's going on if, at least, I'm entertained. Look at The Big Sleep for instance. There will never be another "Chinatown" I'm afraid, regardless of what Mr Ellroy thinks. The one element that sees you through this inconsequential mess is Josh Harnett's face. At times he looks as confused as I did and just as annoyed. Who can blame him? Hilary Swank, what was she doing? She looked like Vampyra's sister, the boring one. What a catastrophic piece of casting. And Fiona Shaw? If the film had been all like her performance the flick could have had a chance at the campiest "noire" ever put on film ever. But not such luck. All this said and done, it's a De Palma movie and that counts for something. Black Dahlia is certainly better than Snake Eyes but as a De Palma fan I felt terribly let down.

I have only seen 16 movies released in 2006 and I think that "The Black Dahlia" (2006) directed by Brian De Palma is one of the most enjoyable. The way it walks, talks, sounds, and feels truly captivated me. It is a fantastic cinematic achievement. It is shocking, dark, very clever, and enormously beautiful. It is over the top but how would you make a movie about the investigation of the most notorious and gruesome never solved murder in Hollywood differently? I like this exploitative, overplayed, smoldering, overwhelming, cheesy, campy Crime / Drama / Mystery / Thriller (my favorite genres) with the evident elements of black comedy (the most favorite genre when it's done well). I don't deny that it has its problems but I still believe it is worth watching and rewatching, especially on DVD when you can stop it and return to the earlier scene to see what you might have missed the first time. "The Black Dahlia" is one of the rare films that make you forget all their flaws. I am still puzzled with the ending but I LOVE the movie; I could not take my eyes off the screen. The way De Palma uses light, shadows, his combination of colors, black and gold - my favorite, his use of stairways, and the way we first are allowed to notice the body - it is Art, noir film made by an Artist. Besides, I simply can't be indifferent to a movie that uses Cole Porter 's song "Love for Sale" which I adore as performed by k.d. lang.

The movie grabbed me with its visual grandeur, heated atmosphere of danger, dark, desperate mood and that's why I like it so much. I don't like it for its story - after all, it is one of the myriads of versions of what had actually happened 60 years ago, I don't admire it for the acting, even though, Mia Krishner as unfortunate Betty Short was heartbreaking and I did like Hillary Swank for the first time in my life (yes, I know that she is two times Oscar winner but I liked her here, when she said to herself, "Bucky...I'll try to remember... that" - it was a good acting, irony which I've never seen in her before.) I also believe that Fiona Shaw was wonderful in her role - it simply could not be played any differently and to make her character so over the top was an artistic achievement and not the lack of acting abilities as many viewers seem to believe.

I respect the movies that entertain me, excite me, and stay with me even if I see their weakness very well. "Black Dahlia" is one of these movies. I am perhaps one of very few viewers in the whole world who actually was satisfied with the ending and the big revelation before it. Yes, it is bizarre, and it is grotesque, but it fits the whole movie perfectly and when I mentioned earlier how clever the movie was, I meant, how well its creators explored just one of the evidences and using the works of literature, art, and earlier cinema, built the whole possible story behind the murder based on it. Once again, "The Black Dahlia" is IMO one of the best and most entertaining movies of last year which I enjoyed enormously.

Directed by the Artist with a unique vision and talent, "The Black Dahlia" will be appreciated as time goes by.

I've been captivated by the Black Dahlia case because it happened in January, 1947, a time when my hormones were kicking in and my crushes tended to focus on dark-haired beauties like Linda Darnell and Gail Russell.

The New York Daily News and the Mirror were quick to publish pictures and headlines about the pretty, raven-haired 22 year-old, whose bisected corpse was discovered in a lot outside Hollywood. The case had no serial killer draw, nor did it require any, the crime itself grotesque enough by itself. Her name was Elizabeth Short.

The case had been addressed, obliquely, in "True Confessions," a novel by James Gregory Dunne, published in 1972. A film of the same name, released in 1981, was both an excellent police procedural and a study of the shadier side of religio-politics, tracing the parallel careers of brothers, one a tainted cop, the other a wheeling and dealing monsignor. In that film, the victim, "The Virgin Tramp," had nothing to do with Elizabeth Short, except for the method of her murder and the means of her disposal.

When I heard that a film was being planned with Brian DiPalma directing, the news evoked a feeling of restrained enthusiasm. The first shoe dropped for me when I read that the screenplay was being based on James Ellroy's novel, The Black Dahlia. It had been several years since I'd read Ellroy's admitted page-turner; but the book was really about two Los Angeles cops, in the harsh, corrupt LAPD atmosphere of the 1940s. Beth Short was a supporting cast member. She deserved better; and she still does, so many years after her death.

Despite all the ambient lawlessness, the film opens with a scheduled fight between former heavyweight Lee Blanchard, played by a tightly-wound Aaron Eckhart and former light-heavy Dwight "Bucky" Bleichert, hair parted in the middle and plastered down, like a prom night bandleader, portrayed by Josh Hartnett. The bout is to promote a proposition for a bond issue, which will cover an across the board pay hike for the LAPD. The high level infighting and the bloody, thudding bout consume nearly a half hour of the film. Blanchard and Bleichert are partners, and they form a trio with Blanchard's lover, Kaye Lake (Scarlett Johansson), whose major preoccupations are the tortured exercise of smoking cigarettes with a long holder and filling out soft white fluffy sweaters, a la Lana Turner.

The two cops, partners known as Fire and Ice, are proccupied with an elderly white perp, his black lady fiend, and an obsese black pimp in part of town where gun shots are not unexpected; and while they're so engaged, we see a mother, deserting her carriage running and screaming for help because of the grim discovery she's made no so far away. Even here, Betty Short gets second billing in her own picture.

When the investigation does focus on Beth Short it is usually through the steadying efforts Inspector Russ Millard (Mike Starr). Bleichert is much distracted and Blanchard becomes consumed, having apparently been emotionally overwhelmed by the filmed vulnerability of Beth Short (Mia Kirshner). Both are seemingly distracted by a soon-to-be released villain from Blanchard's past, days away from freedom.

Kirshner is one of the better elements of the film, capturing the Massachusetts-born girl, in over her head in a futile search for stardom. Striving for stardom, she slides down the greased walls of flashy nightspots, where high rollers like Madeleine Linscott (Hilary Swank) go slumming for kicks. Linscott's parents, Emmett Linscott (John Kavanagh, looking Machiavellian) and Ramona (Fiona Shaw, a kinetic and spastic wreck) are properly neurotic, having their former dog now a stuffed tribute to Daddy's first million. Daddy's a transported Scot whose made his fortune in housing developments, hastily built with left-over studio throw aways.

With Di Palma we always get striking images. Mark Isham can construct the perfect score for any genre. Vilmos Zsigmond's cinematography is gripping. Beth Short is dead. Her case is unsolved. She deserves better.

In 1947 at the age of 22, Elizabeth Short, an aspiring actress, was found murdered in a vacant lot in Los Angeles. Her body had been severely mutilated and cut in half at the waist. The case was nicknamed "The Black Dahlia" by newspaper reporters seeking to capitalize on the then-popular movie "The Blue Dahlia" which was enjoying its theatre run at the time.

The case remains unsolved, although at its peak police suspects included Norman Chandler, the Publisher of the Los Angeles Times, and folksinger Woody Guthrie. More recently true crime authors have gone so far as to speculate that Orson Wells was the killer.

Enter novelist James Ellroy (L.A. Confidential) and Director Brian De Palma (The Untouchables, Scarface, Dressed to Kill), who had signed on to bring Ellroy's novel based on the case to the big screen in a film-noir homage to movies like Double Indemnity. Anyone could be forgiven for thinking that with the talents of these two behind the camera, and the on screen presence of Scarlett Johansson, Josh Hartnett, Aaron Eckhart and Hillary Swank, The Black Dahlia would be a delightfully dark fedora-filled pot boiler that would be entertaining from beginning to end.

Sadly, such is not the case. Instead what gets served up is a muddled, confusing and at times hysterically over-acted movie that seems to treat the actual Dahlia case as mere window dressing for other, less engrossing story lines. There are no less that three plots to this film, all of them seemingly competing against the Dahlia murder mystery for top billing. In fact, at times I got the impression that Ellroy's script would rather delve into anything else, other than the actual murder, as if looking for any excuse not to get in sync with the film's title.

It's too bad because among this film's few highlights are the screen test clips featuring a glimpse into the soul of Elizabeth (Betty) Short, played mesmerizingly by the stunning Mia Kirshner.

I couldn't help but feel that if Ellroy and De Palma had jettisoned some of the extraneous competing plots, and instead placed their focus on telling more of Short's back story rather than the confused gumshoe narrative that they went with, the end result would have been a vastly superior film.