Pun Salad

Mrs. Salad and Pun Son went to choir practice; Pun Daughter went to a friend's birthday party; nothing on TV. But I'd been thinking about seeing this movie, and it came to our local dinky movie theater, so …

This movie was written and directed by Shane Black, previously known for writing and producing some of the ultraviolent brain-dead (but fun) blockbusters of the late '80s and early '90s (e.g., Lethal Weapon, The Last Boy Scout, The Long Kiss Goodnight). This, in contrast, is a little movie. The protagonist, Harry Lockhart (played by Robert Downey Jr.) narrates with the full knowledge that it is a movie, which is an interesting twist. He's a small-time New York crook who gets thrown into a noirish murder/kidnapping plot in LA. The plot is in-your-face about its own unbelievability, and has no problem mashing together jokes, violence, sex, and ugly perversion.

In short, recommended, but I think you'll have to hustle to catch it in the theatres. (On the other hand, it's not the kind of movie that would lose much in a DVD viewing, so don't go nuts.)

Larry Miller has a small but (as usual) dead on performance. Amazon link above goes to the movie soundtrack, they don't have a picture for the DVD yet.