Subtitles: English (plus hearing impaired), Hebrew
Widescreen: 2.35:1 (Super 35)
16:9-Enhanced: Yes
Macrovision: Yes
Disc Format: DVD 9
Price: £18.99
Extras:
Audio descriptive track
Director:
Shane Black
Producer:
Joel Silver
Screenplay:
Shane Black (Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, Last Action Hero, The Last Boy Scout, Lethal Weapon, The Long Kiss Goodnight, The Monster Squad)
Music:
John Ottman
Cast :
Harry Lockhart: Robert Downey Jr
Gay Perry: Val Kilmer
Harmony Faith Lane: Michelle Monaghan
Harlan Dexter: Corbin Bernsen
Dabney Shaw: Larry Miller
Mr Frying Pan: Dash Mihok
Mr Fire: Rockmond Dunbar
Pink Hair Girl: Shannyn Sossamon
Flicka: Angela Lindvall
Protocop: Chris Gilman
Once thing we're informed of early on in Kiss Kiss Bang Bang
is that the narration comes from the lead character Harry Lockhart (Robert Downey Jr), although
it's done in a less-than-conventional style which sets the lackadaisical tone this movie follows from
start to finish.
Harry is rather an accidental actor. Thanks to an altercation I'll leave you to discover, Harry's
either going to end up in custody or on his way to Hollywood. His agent, Dabney Shaw (Larry Miller),
hires him to play the part of a private eye in a new movie and for the purpose of method acting, he'll tag
along with a real life detective, Perry Van Shrike, aka Gay Perry (Val Kilmer).
At a party, hosted by Hollywood mogul Harlan Dexter (Corbin Bernsen), he meets aspiring actress
Harmony (Michelle Monaghan) and is smitten, but the meeting that involves this trio is one that
starts off a chain of events involving murder, double-crossing, a girl with pink hair
(A Knight's Tale's
Shannyn Sossamon)
and a finger getting cut off, much to the dismay of its owner.
Beginning with a scene of Harry as a young boy, pretending to be a magician and doing the old standard
of the "sawing a lady in half" circus trick, part of his story when he comes to be an adult is seeing
Harmony and her reminding him of the girl he knew at school but never managed to date, while she has
her own short back-story which involves being addicted to old Jonny Gossamer detective novels where each
story had to seemingly-unconnected cases that fused together by the end and also leaving her sister back
in her home town, claiming she'll come back for her later once she makes it big in Hollywood.
In a story that's told day-by-day, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang is complex and quite entertaining while
it's on, keeping your attention for the full duration, but it isn't gripping and won't leave a lasting
memory in your brain. It tries to be 'knowing' but just comes across, ultimately, as ludricous and
forgettable, including scenes such as those where we learn Harry has kids he hardly sees, but despite
the journey his character goes through, there's little here to connect with the situation when looking
back on it.
There are good, if not career-challenging, performances from all the cast members. Robert Downey Jr is
his usual, likeable self while Val Kilmer looked set to be an A-list star after a performance as Jim Morrison
in 1991's The Doors, but then threw it away by appearing in tripe like Batman Forever and
1997's movie version of The Saint, but
this film looks set to putting him back a road that will make sure he can't ruin a film again.
Michelle Monaghan looks hot in this film and certainly looks to be one to watch as she handles
herself well in what is practically a lead role. Strangely, the cover of the DVD shows her smoking but
not at all in the film, even though Downey Jr does frequently. I wonder what prompted that?
Larry Miller and Corbin Bernsen fulfil their roles without complaint and Rockmond Dunbar,
as one of two henchmen, Mr Fire, has a noteable presence because he also currently stars in tense drama
Prison Break as escaped convict C-Note.
The film is presented in anamorphic 2.35:1 widescreen with few problems to the print, and looking good
but not particularly outstanding throughout. The Dolby Digital 5.1 soundmix has a couple of moments that
utilise split-surround sound while the rest is merely standard fare so it certainly will not be one to use
as a demo disc.
There are subtitles in English and Hebrew only, plus a 'hard of hearing' version for the former.
The disc contains 29 chapters which is a good amount for a film of this length, but once you load up
this disc, you have to go through four pages of language selections to choose "UK"! This is then followed
by one of those stupid 'anti piracy' trailers which, thankfully, can be skipped through but do you really
need that once you've bought the damn DVD?
Then, you STILL don't get to the film as you get a 2.35:1 letterboxed trailer for V for Vendetta
before finally arriving at the actual menu, which shows clips from the film amongst the meagre options of
languages, scene selections and 'play movie'. Wot - no extras? No - unless you count an audio descriptive
track that runs throughout the film, which I don't.
Don't be fooled by the retail price stated above. Although companies like Warner are trying to add an extra
quid or two onto the RRP of a DVD, give it a bit of time and the prices drop like a stone. At the time of
writing, just a few months after release, this one's down to costing just under a fiver, so if you like
the actors in this film it's certainly worth a purchase.
That said, anyone with money to burn might like to know that as Christmas approaches Warner are releasing
this in both HD-DVD and Blu-Ray formats, more info on which can be accessed at the links above.
DVDs reviewed by the editor are watched on a Panasonic TXW32R4 32" widescreen TV
connected to either a Creative Dxr2 DVD-ROM player or Microsoft Xbox and
played through a Sony STR-DB930 amplifier.
PC games reviewed by the editor are on:
Since Nov 2005: Intel Pentium D 830 3.0Ghz, 1Gb RAM, 128Mb nVidia GeForce 6700XL, Windows XP
Since Aug 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.66Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb GeForce4 MX440 graphics, Windows XP
Since May 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.6Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb ATI Radeon 9600TX graphics, Windows XP
Since Jun 2002: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, 64Mb ATI Radeon 8500LE
Since May 2000: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, Voodoo 3 3000 AGP
DVD: 
