Genre: Crime/Drama/Action/Mystery/Biography
Starring: Josh Hartnett, Aaron Eckhart, Scarlett Johansson, Hilary Swank, Mia Kirshner
The movie industry has a lot of fame, money and glamour. And it is these elements that attracts young people from various parts of the country to live their dreams of being in the movies. Some young people get through but many end up making compromises, are led with false promises and end up doing things they never wished to do. Elizabeth Short (Kirshner) was one such young lady who came to Hollywood to make a mark in the movies but landed up becoming a heavily mutilated corpse. Dwight Bleichert (Hartnett) and Lee Blanchard (Eckhart) are two LAPD officers who are close friends and partners. They are highly looked up to in the police force and are well respected for the work they do. The duo are put in charge of the murder of Short, whom the media dubs as The Black Dahlia murder case. The soon discover that Short used to do pornographic movies to make her daily bread and butter and used to hang around with a lot of lesbian women. One thing leads to another and the duo start discovering dark secrets about Short and many other people in LA. Although the movie is fundamentally based on the murder of Short, the rest of the movie is a work of fiction. Till date, Short's murder case is unsolved but the movie takes it in a different tangent altogether. Everything apart from her murder is pure fiction, simply to build interest in the movie. The movie is an adaptation of James Ellroy's novel with the same name, who was also the writer of L.A. Confidential. Being a movie with suspense, the build up in the plot to the ultimate climax was missing and that is what shot the entire movie down. Perhaps even a stronger cast could have done wonders for the movie and made it far more interesting.
Thumbs up: A very interesting story
Thumbs down: The actual execution of the plot
Rating: 6.5/10
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