Remember the Classics

‘Darkman’ (1990)

Coming hot on the heels of Tim Burton’s first “Batman” film, Sam Raimi’s “Darkman” can almost be seen as a parody of the Dark Knight’s entertaining yet undeniably fatuous cinematic debut. He even went so far as to hire the same composer (Danny Elfman) to score it, ironically offering a soundtrack that is unilaterally darker. Burton encompassed his Batman in patent ridiculousness and clouded it in noir lighting, which was all well and good but not really tailored to the character’s inherent darkness. The appropriately titled “Darkman” seems to take on Burton’s aesthetic, but applies it in a way that is more suited to its premise.

Dr. Peyton Westlake (Liam Neeson, pre-“Schindler’s List”) is a scientist who is dating an attorney, Julie (Frances McDormand), who stumbles upon something that threatens to take down a wealthy industrialist (Colin Friels): a piece of evidence known as “the Bellasarious Memorandum.” When crime lord Robert G. Durant (the smooth, growling Larry Drake) goes looking for the document, he and his goons discover Westlake, blow up his lab, and leave him for dead. Badly burned, Westlake turns up in a hospital as a John Doe. In an effort to ease his pain, the doctors cut off the nerve sensations from his entire body, which jacks up his adrenaline, making him unnaturally strong but psychologically unstable.

There is no cure, however, for his horribly scarred face. It’s a good thing, then, that the scientist’s subject of research at the time just happened to be a synthetic skin for burn victims. So, with photographic data dumped into his computer, he can create a near-perfect mask of nearly anyone to engage in undercover work. The downside: he was never able to perfect the skin, so it will only survive in sunlight during the amusingly arbitrary time limit of 99 minutes. Now, spending most of his time bandaged up like the Invisible Man, Westlake must simultaneously reignite his romance with Julie and attain his single-minded revenge against Durant and his men.

“Darkman” is rife with that same hyper-logic that draws readers to comic books in the first place—the kind of fare that causes smirks rather than the expected groans when the plot takes an unbelievable twist. It works because Darkman smirks along with you; these goofy turns are entirely self-conscious, and dialogue is so full of silly audacity and wit that it begs to be placed inside of a word balloon. Perhaps “Darkman” works in this respect because it essentially aspires to become another medium, without the pressures of trying to be cinematic. It’s only several steps up from a comic book: in an inspired pan shot during Darkman’s “origin story,” Westlake is thrust into a series of glass cabinets, which act as surrogate panels, as if being read from left to right.

As a character, Darkman does hold some emotional drama, but the film wisely keeps him at an arm’s length to solidify him as a properly “legendary” superhero/anti-hero. It exemplifies Raimi’s talent as a director, and demonstrates that there are fundamental differences in individual superhero films. His work here is a vast deviation from his own “Spider-Man” series, which demands a much more fleshed-out, human connection to the protagonist.

Before hitting the big time with heady dramas and biopics, Liam Neeson was a master of overacting in “Darkman.” This may come as something of a shock to those who know him for nuanced performances. As Darkman, he shouts at the top of his lungs as nearly every opportunity, which plays so perfectly into the rest of the film. Surprisingly, Neeson was up for a challenge here. With Peyton’s face obscured by bandages for most of the film, voice inflection was probably the most important factor of a properly comic book performance, and he meets the challenge. And, although Frances McDormand oddly shows little of the multifaceted talent that earned her an Oscar for “Fargo,” she is perfectly serviceable as Julie, a typical call-to-action romantic character who still manages to hold some surprises.

“Darkman” ends on a somewhat inconclusive note that simply begged for a sequel, a television series, or some kind of extension beyond a single movie. Darkman probably deserved more than he got, however; a television pilot never saw the light of day, and fans were handed two direct-to-video sequels without Neeson or Raimi, universally considered inferior products: “Darkman II: The Return of Durant,” which boasts the inimitable Larry Drake with his “evil” setting turned to high gear but little else; and “Darkman III: Die Darkman Die,” easily one of the worst, most awkward films ever made. One cannot help but imagine: what if Neeson hadn’t taken the high road with “Schindler’s List,” and what if Raimi hadn’t concluded the “Evil Dead” series with “Army of Darkness?” The reality of the situation isn’t a bad trade-off, all things considered, but man, what we wouldn’t do for a real sequel to “Darkman.”