I recently watched Dark City as part of a Sci-Fi double feature with District 9, and to quote an opinion I respect; 'I guess Dark City is more Fantasy than Sci-Fi, and perhaps less original'. I agree and I can't say I loved it. It seems a strange thing to say about a fantasy sci-fi film but after it had finished my instinct told me it was too far-fetched, though I think to put it more accurately, I found it OTT.
It's hard to articulate exactly why really. I found myself thinking that it played like the sort of film that is more interesting and easy to follow if you are somewhat familiar with the source material (in that sense it felt a bit like Lynch's Dune) - but it is not adapted from source material. The story is by the director Alex Proyas, who four years earlier made The Crow, a film I really love (which incidentally could quite easily have been titled Dark City) His earlier effort has such a distinctive visual style that is established in the opening shots, and in fairness, you can say the same about Dark City - not that it is quite as distinctive, but it is efficiently established straight away, which is certainly a strength of the film. There are technically lots of good things about it. I liked alot of the art design and the look of the city, it reminded me a bit of the curious French film City of Lost Children. Creativity was not lacking, I liked the concept of the 'spaceship', and the story overall had real ambition which is not to be underplayed, in fact, I found myself thinking (in no small part down to the supernatural aspects) that it had the makings of a good anime feature. Rufus sewell makes a good character for noir, with his imposing state he is difficult to read.
Despite all this food stuff, I still found it curiously lacking in effect, and something about the villains and their personification I found tacky. The mystery story wasn't overly compelling for me although gladly things were more interesting after the truth was revealed shortly before the end. It just didn't do it for me for some unknown reason. Sometimes that happens, and gladly it makes film discussion all the more interesting.
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