A Scanner Darkly (USA, 2006)
Richard Linklater’s A Scanner Darkly is a dystopian fever dream of paranoia, addiction, and surveillance, adapted from Philip K. Dick’s semi-autobiographical novel of the same name. Utilizing rotoscope animation (you will either like the style or you won't), the film blurs the line between reality and hallucination, mirroring its protagonist’s crumbling sense of self.
The story follows Bob Arctor (Keanu Reeves), an undercover agent assigned to monitor a group of drug users—including himself. The drug in question, Substance D, causes severe cognitive dissonance, splitting the brain into warring hemispheres. As Arctor continues ingesting the drug for the sake of his investigation, he begins to lose track of his identity, unable to distinguish his role as a narcotics agent from his life as an addict.
The film is permeated with cynicism and decay. Arctor works for a faceless bureaucracy, and both he and other members of law enforcement wear “scramble suits,” which obscure their identities even from one another. This injects a sense of surrealism and dark humour, while highlighting Arctor’s growing disillusionment, paranoia, and estrangement from reality. As he sinks deeper into addiction and surveillance-induced paranoia, the distinction between the world’s inherent absurdity and the effects of the drug becomes increasingly blurred.
Many scenes could be lifted from any film about junkies. Arctor’s drug-addled friends pontificate about philosophy while struggling with basic daily tasks. A simple car breakdown spirals into an extended sequence of paranoia, where the group convinces themselves that their house is bugged and that authorities have likely planted drugs to entrap them. They consider selling the house but are stumped by how to price the hidden drugs, as they neither know the type nor the quantity.
Reeves delivers a surprisingly strong performance in the lead role, playing to his strengths as a quiet, introspective presence. Robert Downey Jr., however, steals nearly every scene as James Barris, an erratic and untrustworthy intellectual whose rapid-fire monologues teeter between brilliance and madness.
The ending is grimly appropriate, reinforcing the film’s bleak worldview.
Rating: 7/10
