As the second Hollywood-noir movie based around a real life mysterious death released in less than two weeks (the other being last week's Hollywoodland), The Black Dahlia makes me appreciate the earlier movie even more. Whereas Hollywoodland was an entertaining and honest look at a man and his broken dreams, The Black Dahlia is a messy, flat out incoherent, and overly stylized farce of a film that sometimes comes across as a parody of film noir, rather than the tribute it's intended to be. Thanks to the mostly uninspired direction by once famed filmmaker, Brian De Palma (who with this film continues his increasing downward spiral), and a few over the top performances that you can almost swear chew holes through the set right there on the screen, the film comes across as laughable more than enthralling.

Set in the late 1940s, the film centers on a tough young cop who is unfortunately named Bucky (Josh Hartnett). Bucky's a cop who used to be a boxer, and has since become a star on the force ever since he and another boxer-turned-cop named Lee (Aaron Eckhart) staged an event fight to help raise support for a Bond Act that gave everyone on the force a raise in pay. Bucky and Lee become fast friends during the build up to the match, and the events that follow, and they become inseparable on and off the force as they solve crimes, and pal around together along with Lee's girl (Scarlet Johansson) in public. Things seem great for the two friends until a murder pops up that may blow some secrets of the past wide open. The murder involves a small-time Hollywood hopeful named Elizabeth Short (Mia Kirshner). The murder scene is grisly, and despite Bucky's objections, Lee gets them assigned to the case.

The Black Dahlia is a film that hits all the expected 40s film noir pit stops. Everybody who walks on screen is a chain smoker, Bucky provides an off camera narration that comes and goes expressing his inner thoughts on the case, there's more red herrings than a fish market, and there's no shortage of suspicious people and weirdos to fill the story with unsavory types. The problem here is that De Palma has filled his story full to bursting with a series of subplots that not only make the movie top heavy, but more confusing than it really needs to be. Besides the murder, there's also a love triangle between Bucky, Lee and his girl, a femme fatale (Hillary Swank) who resembles the victim and whom Bucky gets involved with, secret pasts, more confessions and double crosses to fill two movies, a sports movie (the opening 15 minutes focus solely on the boxing match), and the femme fatale's very dysfunctional family that includes a mother so crazy and goofy she comes across almost like a live action cartoon character. (It doesn't help that the performance by Fiona Shaw goes past camp into scene-chewing bizarreness.) The film's two hour running time just can't hold it all, and the way the movie keeps on jumping around from one plot to the next almost makes it feel like we're watching three or four different movies, none of them good enough for us to focus our entire attention on, unfortunately.

It would seem that screenwriter Josh Friedman tried to cram so much of the novel by James Ellroy into the movie that he forgot to find a central point for the screenplay to focus on. This makes the movie come across as unfocused and rougher than it should be. Another rewrite or two could have probably helped. However, the problems are not all his. A lot of the blame falls in the hands of De Palma whom just can't seem to get a hold of any good performances, or coherent storytelling. This is a surprise, since judging by the man's past work, you'd think this material would be a good match for him. Alas, he completely slips here. None of the characters are remotely likeable or interesting. The only character trait that everybody in this movie seems to share is that they smoke 20 packs a day. I actually think there are scenes where one character will light up three times in one sequence. One of the film's stars, Aaron Eckhart, previously starred in a very good comedy called Thank You For Smoking, where he played a tobacco industry spin doctor who at one point of the film was assigned to make smoking "cool" again in the movies. I couldn't help but think of his character while watching this movie. Then again, maybe it's because I was thinking I'd rather be watching that movie than this. When they're not lighting up, the characters either overact to heights unknown, camping up their dialogue to unintentionally comic levels, or underperforming to the point that I almost wanted to check if the actors on screen actually had a pulse.

Let's face it, people, Josh Hartnett is not a good enough of an actor to come across as a tough as nails film noir detective who seduces dangerous women. No matter how gruff he tries to make himself sound on his voice over, no matter how much smoke he inhales, his almost babyish and unemotional face makes him look out of place. As a main character and a protagonist, Hartnett's Bucky is about as easy to root for as a total stranger you know nothing about. Scarlet Johansson is a fine actress who has done a lot of fine work, but this performance is not one of them. She too seems out of place, and seems to be trying too hard to imitate the great screen sirens of the past, and fails miserably at it. She lacks passion and mystery in her performance, and Swank as the other woman suffers from the same problem. Neither of them is able to create any heat with Hartnett, which is a mortal sin for a "sexy" noir thriller that Dahlia aspires to be.

Long before The Black Dahlia is over, we find it impossible to care about what's going on. Its convoluted and confused storytelling, and dull as dirt characters, create a deadly tag team of boredom of monotony. Movies like this are supposed to excite us and thrill us as they explore forbidden passions and a seedy underworld. The movie fulfills these requirements, but because of its own poor choices, they come across as a lot less exciting as they should be. The Black Dahlia is a complete failure, and another knock against De Palma's already falling film career.

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