With a certain Kathryn Bigelow movie coming out on DVD on Jan. 12th and a rather prominent James Cameron movie in the theaters, I felt it apropos to visit a little-seen collaboration of the two: Strange Days.
Released in 1995, Strange Days is set on the day before and the day of New Year's Eve 1999. As a near-future cyberpunk film, the technological advances are modest. The highlighted technology are SQUID decks and clips. SQUID is the ultimate in immersion entertainment. Not only does "playback" visually put you in the action, it sends feedback to your body to make you feel like you are there. Since the inevitable application of playback involves porn and vicarious crime sprees, SQUID devices are extralegal. Sleazy ex-cop Lenny Nero (Ralph Fiennes, The English Patient) deals in decks and clips, buying from the questionable and selling to the uptight. When a mysterious playback is left for Nero and his contacts end up dead, Nero has to unravel the truth before a race war erupts at turn of the millennium.
Strange Days pulls no punches. It is rated R and deservedly so. It is also a well-told mystery that puts its small amount of sci-fi tech to good use. The writing, provided by Cameron and Jay Cocks (Gangs of New York), is good. While the technology isn't as integrated or ubiquitous as it should be, the fictional 1999 martial-law Los Angeles is well made. Realizing that hand-held cameras would be too shaky and steady cams too bulky to capture true 1st person point of view, Bigelow and Lightstorm Entertainment innovated a new sort of wearable camera.
Despite the action and acting pedigree (the film also features Angela Basset, Juliette Lewis, Vincent D'Onofrio, and Tom Sizemore), it received mixed reviews and a cool audience reception, making only $7.9 million during its short theatrical run. It is currently available on DVD.
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