The Alphabet Project: S is for...

A Scanner Darkly (2006)

The L.A. of a not-too-distant future suffers a surge of drug abuse involving a new ultra-addictive and eventually brain-damaging substance simply named "D". Bob Arctor (Keanu Reeves) is an undercover narc leading a double life, dutifully reporting to his superiors while effectively having abandoned whatever normal existence he had for a "D" user/dealer career. But this schizophrenic situation and the drug-induced memory and concentration lapses put Bob under mounting stress. Hilarity ensues when an informant accuses Arctor of crimes he didn't commit he and his rag-tag band of friends, his girlfriend Donna, and his roommates Barris (Robert Downey, Jr.) and Luckman (Woody Harrelson) are put under observation, and the department puts one of their undercover agents in charge of gathering evidence, Bob himself.

Trivia: Based on Philip K. Dick's personal drug experiences. The title comes from a paraphrasing of the letters of the Apostle Paul in the New Testament. Paul writes on "looking into a mirror darkly". Robert Downey Jr. wrote most of his lines down on post-it notes and scattered them around the set so he could read off them while filming a scene. The rotoscoping team simply animated over the notes to remove them from the film during post-production.

Okay, the first thing you may be asking is why the department suspected Arctor and put him under observation when he was the undercover officer, well, that is simple to explain, when Arctor is in the police station he wears a "Scramble Suit" in which his image and voice is scrambled, if you met him on the street all you would see is a diffused shape that has other peoples images superimposed on it, so a face will be made up of four different faces...come to think of it, it isn't that simple to explain, so basically nobody at the police station knew what he actually looked like and didn't know what name he was using. The animation used is a rotoscoping effect where they animate over the actual actors that are on film. So the images like like the actors. I think this actually made the movie better because the actors, knowing they were going to be animated, acted out more expressively, especially Rory Cochrane who plays and addict named Freck. He was awesomely funny in his expressions. This is one of those types of movies that at first is hard to grasp but as you go everything clicks into place.

Up Next: "T", This Week's Clue: The title character is dead throughout most of the movie. Get those guesses in! Only seven more letters to go! And now for last week's guesses:

Shaft - Shut Your Mouth! New York City police detective John Shaft (nephew of the original 1970s detective) goes on a personal mission to make sure the son of a real estate tycoon is brought to justice after a racially-motivated murder.

Slither - A small town is taken over by an alien plague, turning residents into zombies and all forms of mutant monsters.

Swordfish - The world's most dangerous spy is hired by the CIA to coerce a computer hacker recently released from prison to help steal billions in unused government funds.