Sci-Fi Month: REDUX #9

The Top 10 Best Sci-Fi Movies You've (probably) Never Heard Of

#9: Strange Days (1995)

What It Is

The cyberpunk brainchild of two people you might be familiar with - James Cameron and Kathryn before-she-was-big Bigelow - and starring a powerhouse cast that includes Ralph Fiennes, Angela Bassett, Juliette Lewis, Tom Sizemore and Vincent D'Onofrio. Strange Days depicts a chaotic Los Angeles in 1999, on the eve of the new millennium. Racial tensions ride at an all time high, distrust of the police is rampant and rioting is a near-daily occurrence. In the midst of all of this is a new technology, a "SQUID" (Superconducting Quantum Interference Device) that is capable of recording or transmitting data directly to an individual's mind. SQUID recordings are the newest and greatest thing in black market circles, with content ranging from robberies gone awry to downright snuff films. One black market dealer, Lenny Nero (Fiennes), stumbles across a SQUID tape that depicts a horrific and politically charged crime, and must rely on the help of his friends Mace (Bassett), a bodyguard for hire, and Max Peltier (Sizemore), a Private Eye, to sort through a labyrinthine plot of double crosses and conspiracies. Simultaneously, Nero is pursued by two corrupt LAPD officers (D'Onofrio and William Fichtner) and tries desperately to repair his damaged relationship with ex-girlfriend and singer Faith (Lewis).

Why You've Never Heard of It

It seems like this movie had everything going for it: a huge budget, James Cameron producing at a time when he was riding high on the success of Terminator 2, an incredibly talented director in Kathryn Bigelow (who had also chalked up a big one on Point Break), and a cast of recognizable and A-list stars. What went wrong?

Well, for starters, I imagine that same question came up quite a bit in the days following the divorce of the aforementioned Mr. Cameron and Ms. Bigelow (they parted in 1991). I'm not saying that this contributed entirely to the commercial failure of the film (which utterly bombed at the box office), but I have no doubt that these individuals had completely different visions for what the film should be. This is not unsubstantiated speculation, by the by: this review from Overdue Reviews (WARNING CONTAINS SPOILERS) points out that Cameron and Bigelow retroactively admitted as much.

Overdue Reviews also posits - and I'm inclined to agree with this latter point above all others - that the movie was simply too awkward to market properly. It reads on paper like a sci-fi mystery/action movie, with some stylish effects and sexy ladies thrown in for good measure. What you get is harsh, unpleasant violence, brutal rape and murder, and some political overtures that your typical action movie audience is not likely to respond well to.

In other words: a ripe recipe for commercial disaster, but also for later rediscovery and cult status.

Why It's Worthy of Inclusion

I've already touched on the "unpleasant" aspects of the movie, and it may have sounded like I was deriding them, but they're actually why I think this movie deserves inclusion on a "best of" list.

Strange Days has a lot going on: a murder mystery, crazy techno-babble, race riots, police corruption...I think if it's guilty of a crime it would be overreaching ambition. It tries to do too much at once. This goes back to the whole "Bigelow vs. Cameron" issue, with Cameron's vision falling firmly on the side of speculation on technology and Bigelow on the side of socio-economic commentary (if you need further proof of that you only need to look at their subsequent resumes).

What it succeeds at the most, for me, is the way it so pointedly captures the perverse, sickening nature of technological voyeurism. The underground dealing of people's experiences - especially the horrific ones - is something that I completely buy into. We already see it in our society today, in the form of internet videos that circulate globally, depicting terrorist torture, bombings, even executions. There's a part of us, no matter how small, that likes to watch.

The mystery aspects - and for what it is, I think it is a very, very good mystery - are there to add to this mystique, this desire to know the goings-on of others. Are we strung along by the desire for truth, or the desire for forbidden knowledge? For a forbidden viewing experience?

There are parts of Strange Days that are incredibly, incredibly, INCREDIBLY hard to watch. But we can't help ourselves. What propels us along? I don't think it's a secret nature of humanity that we like suffering, and I don't think that's what Strange Days suggests it is.

Rather, I think the ending of Strange Days (and if you read all of that Overdue Review, you just had it spoiled for you), awkward though it may be, holds the key. There is a point where we realize that watching is a fantasy, but acting is a reality. It may take some muddling, some plot gaps, and some weird fight choreography to get there, but Strange Days finds a way.

My final verdict: worth a rental for all audiences, not just sci-fi fans. Everyone likes to watch, right?