Film Friday

This week's Pick: Kiss Kiss Bang Bang

Kiss Kiss Bang Bang is a comedy crime who-done-it that was supposed to be Robert Downey Jr's comeback vehicle in 2005 (before it finally happened with Iron Man and Tropic Thunder). In the movie Downey is Harry, a self aware forgetful narrator. Harry is a robber who's partner gets shot during heist and as he runs from the cops he stumbles into a movie addition and the character he reads for has an alarmingly similar background causing his real emotions to be mistaken for genuine acting skills. He is both spared from the cops and sent to Hollywood to attend parties and screen tests. In LA Harry attends a party where he meets "Gay" Perry, a real life private investigator who will work with Harry to improve his acting and has a brush with his dream girl, one who reminds him of an unattainable girl from high school. This girl. Harmony, actually turns out to be THE unattainable girl from high school, Harry served as her confidant and she got involved with every other guy in school. Harmony has a past she is running from, her father was nightly abusing her younger sister and at age 16, she left it all for Hollywood and to pursue her dream of acting. During Harry's work with Perry, he and Perry stumble upon an actual murder. They flee the scene, Harry gets a call from the police saying that Harmony has killed herself. It turns out that it was actually Harmony's little sister who killed herself, a fact that Harmony refuses to believe. Harmony believing that Harry is a P.I. enlists his help to solve the mystery of her sister's death. Harry is unable to tell Harmony the truth, not wanting to lose contact with her, at the same time he finds the murdered girl he and Perry saw earlier in the shower of his hotel room. The plots of the seemingly two unrelated crimes merge and mix and strangely follow the same plot structures of old detective crime stories Harmony and Harry read as children.

My thoughts- very funny, Robery Downey Jr. is in a classic role. Val Kilmer and Downey mix well together on screen. The plot turns are interesting and unexpected. Check out Michelle Monaghan before she hit it big with Made of Honor and Eagle Eye.