The Crow (1994)
Director: Alex Proyas
Cast: Brandon Lee, Michael Wincott, Ernie Hudson, Rochelle
Davis,
Bai Ling
When I saw
The Crow on its original release back in
1994; it had the same effect on me as when I saw Heath Ledger in Terry
Gilliam’s
The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus (2009); I felt I was seeing a ghost.
There’s something eerie about seeing an actor’s last film; you feel as if the
actor still lives on even though they’ve just recently passed away, somehow immortalized by film. These types of films are
more of a shock when they have scenes dealing with the death of the character
the dead actor played. For example, in
The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus, Heath
Ledger has a scene in which he hangs himself from a bridge. This was a chilling scene to watch, but the full effect of this scene isn't felt until minutes after, when Ledger pops
out of a treasure chest, alive and kicking, like some twisted magic trick being
played on all of us. The end result,
when watched in the darkness of a theater, is truly eerie. Brandon Lee pulled
of a similar magic trick in
The Crow because as most of you undoubtedly know,
he died while making that film; which makes the scene in which he literally
crawls out of his grave so macabre, emotional and undoubtedly powerful. The irony can be cut with a knife. There’s a scene in which Officer Albrecht
recognizes The Crow as being Eric Draven, the young man who had been brutally
murdered a year ago. Officer Albrecht tells Eric Draven, “Don’t move Snow
White! You move, you’re dead!” and
Brandon Lee slowly looks up to him, with white make up on his face and
says: “And I say I’m dead, and I move!” How
brutally ironic and in a way fittingly poetic when we take in consideration the
source material; James O’Barr’s poetic graphic novel, The Crow.
From inception, the idea behind The Crow was fueled by death
and tragedy. James O’Barr, the creator behind The Crow started working on his
graphic novel as a way to exorcise his own demons. You see, O’Barr’s girlfriend
was run down by a drunk driver and as a way to get rid of all the pain that her
death caused him; he started working on The Crow. The result was a romantic and
poetic bullet opera fueled by despair. O’Barr told The Boston Phoenix that
“there is pure anger in every page”, he even went on to mention that instead of
being cathartic; he was even more messed up by the time he finished working on
the book. The untimely death of Brandon Lee amplified his sadness and anger,
making him wish he’d never done the book, blaming god for his luck in life.
“God is a bastard” said O’Barr in an interview he did for the Boston Phoenix,
“If there is one.” Tragedy it seems, was meant to follow James O’Barr
throughout his life because while the comic and the film brought him success,
his life was still mired by tragedy. The Crow was a bitter sweet victory.
The production of this film was muddled by a bunch of weird
accidents like a carpenter accidentally drilling a screwdriver through his
hand, another carpenter getting burned by power lines, a disgruntled sculptor
crashing his car on to the set, a truck catching fire on the set and Brandon
Lee getting cut by break away glass! This collection of accidents, plus the
death of Brandon Lee leads some to believe that The Crow was one of those
cursed films, like the Poltergeist franchise. Of course that’s all a lot of
bull crap, these are all things that could and have happened on any film set,
which are usually a maelstrom of craziness, more so on films with smaller
budgets. Best part of the whole ordeal is that an amazing film shined through the
troubled production. In my book, The Crow remains a masterpiece of Gothic
cinema. So much so that I try and pinpoint a film that is like it, but nothing
pops up. I mean, sure, it’s a revenge film of which there are many, but none of
them have the combination of elements that brought The Crow together with such
panache. It is in my book a rather unique film.
James O’Barr’s graphic novel is a mixture of romance,
violence, poetry and rock and roll and this is one of the things I love most about
the film, it’s just so damn rock and roll! This movie is so rock and roll that
Eric Draven walks around with a freaking guitar on his back! No amplifier or
anything, just the freaking guitar on his back, because you know, it makes him
look that much cooler. Even though James O’Barr is constantly quoting Joy
Division and The Cure songs (two bands that inspired O’Barr as he drew and
wrote) it was actually the filmmakers who made Eric Draven the lead singer of a
rock band named ‘Hang Man’s Joke’, probably as a way to reference the death of
Ian Curtis, the lead singer of Joy Division, who hung himself. How rock and
roll is this film? Well, there’s this awesome scene in which Draven is sitting
on a roof top, playing his electric guitar as the sun sets. That scene is in my
book the epitome of rock and roll coolness. So yeah, while the book displays an
obvious affection for rock and roll as a means to channel the whole melancholic
sadness that Eric Draven is going through, it was the filmmakers who amplified
this angle to the max. And it was Alex Proyas, the films director who opted to
make the film dark and noir-ish, originally, Proyas wanted to film the whole
thing in black and white, but the studio opposed so he went with a color
palette infused with a lot of black and white, a lot of grays. The result is
one of the darkest films you will ever see. Almost the entire film takes place
during the nighttime which gives it a very unique feel.
Of course, there are some differences between graphic novel
and film, characters are switched around and eliminated as is common place with
book to film adaptations. One noticeable change was that in the book, they
don’t attack Shelly and Eric while they are in their apartment. In the comic,
the reason for their murder is a lot more random. Funboy and his goons are out
on a drug infused joy ride when they come upon Eric and Shelly, whose car broke
down on a lonely road. In the book, the one who suffers “thirty hours of pain”
in a hospital is actually Eric Draven himself, not Shelly. The comic has way
more poetic passages of Eric Draven remembering Shelly and their times
together, also, there’s the mysterious ghost/zombie cowboy that lurks ominously
in the background of the comic, guiding Eric Draven through his mission here on
earth. They actually shot some scenes with this ghost cowboy character; he was
played by Michael Berryman. Unfortunately those scenes were deleted for pacing
reasons. Still, even with all these alterations and deletions, I’d say that the
film is an excellent translation of the graphic novel. Not only does the film
capture the spirit and essence of James O’Barr’s comic books, it also adds a
more rock and rollish vibe to the proceedings.
At the same time, there are scenes which are perfect
translations of the comic, for example, the scene in which Eric Drave visits
Gideon’s Pawn Shop is an almost panel for panel translation of what we get in
the comic…another faithfully translated sequence is the one in which Eric Draven
visits Top Dollar’s hide out, stands on the table and starts shooting everybody. The only difference is that the comic is
actually a hell of a lot more violent with that shoot out. The Crow isn’t a
story about a hero, in fact, James O’Barr himself says that he doesn’t see Eric
Draven as a hero, rather, he feels that “He can be absolutely cold-hearted and
ruthless at times. When he goes into a room to get one person, everyone else in
the room is probably going to die as well. I think what he is doing is terribly
romantic, but I wouldn’t call him a hero” I agree. I’d say that there’s no
mercy for the wicked when it comes to Eric Draven. He figures if you’re in a
room with Top Dollar and Fun Boy, then you must be a bad guy, and bad guys
gotta pay, they gotta be stopped. Both the book and the film are infused with a
burning hatred for scumbags.
And speaking of that shoot out, I recently re-watched the
film to write this review and damn, I was blow away by how good it is, it has
to be one of the all time best shoot outs ever, right up there with the shoot
out from Michael Mann’s Heat (1995). This shoot out has to be one of the
coolest, most extended shoot outs in film history! It goes on forever! Bottom
line is The Crow is perfectly Gothic, dark and extremely violent film. The
black leather, the rock and roll, the gothic churches, the stormy lighting
filled nights…it all adds up to the perfect gothic masterpiece. I still to this
day love it and considering the rest of his body of work, I still consider it Alex
Proya’s best film. It’s also Brandon Lees best film, the one that made him a
star, it’s the one he is most remembered by. He pulled off such a sensible
performance, you feel his pain and his love for Shelly. True, Brandon Lee went
out before his time, his death was as untimely as it could get, but what an
amazingly beautiful swan song this film is. My hats down to you Mr. Lee. It’s
true, you are dead, but you still walk my friend, you still walk.
Rating: 5 out of 5
