Brick

The first scene is a boy and a girl in the water presumably dead. We then take a trip two years back in time. Brendan is a school boy who right at the beginning of the movie. He gets a call from a girl named Emily who needs his help in some mysterious way. With the help of a kid called The Brain he hopes to get some information. Intercepting an invitation that was supposed to be from Emily, he is able to get to go to a party called Halloween in January.

In the party he is visited by a girl in red, also known as Cara, as he fixes himself a glass of sherry. They sit, they mingle, and she gives him a little bit of information ("coffee and pie oh my!"). Cara leaves for a couple seconds, asks him to wait, but he ends up getting out of the party altogether and following her. Some muscle-headed guy starts to yell at Cara and drives off. He ends up ditching the party.

Brendan then goes to see a man named Dode the next morning. Dode says at first that he has "enough on his plate without having to deal with a jilted ex." He asks where Emily is, Dode says "you better get it while it's good". Uh oh. We see that not only is Brendan smart and resourceful but is also a bad ass and a good slugger. He gives Dode a nice slug (it was actually so dramatic due to the shot if you love mis en scene). After that he asks Dode again where Emily is and slaps him around so badly. Basically she's with Dode and thinks that Brendan will only make things worse.

Turns out Dode was telling the truth. Dode meets up with Emily that afternoon and they hug and a letter is transferred between Dode and Emily. Brendan is overlooking the whole thing hidden in a hill. Later Emily and Brendan meet up and they have a talk about how Brendan judges people and Emily explains why she broke up with him in the first place. She came to say goodbye and he came to get her out of a tough spot with whatever is the brick or the Pin. At the end of the conversation they hug and Brendan ends up taking her notebook (where all of her letters are kept).

He finds one letter in particular. It's an uppercase A and midnight on the bottom. The Brain and Brendan try to figure out where this is pointing towards. This is the start of something big. The letter might be where the drugs are being taken and it's the upper crust of the whole thing. The A might be a random symbol, a symbol of the place, or it might be a drawing of the place. Hopefully Brendan can make this right and rectify all the wrongs.

In comparison to the rest of the noir films I have been seeing this was incredibly enjoyable to watch. Also it had some great cinematography, I felt that the characterization of the characters were very smooth (of course the reason I judged the others so harshly was because they weren't smooth and modern in terms of how they did it). Also I liked the way that the storyline progressed. It was more of a character driven story rather than a story driven by the plot.

I felt that the movie worked in many ways. I felt like the kid was just as resourceful as any other kid and that the Brain and Brendan had their vices and their strengths in whatever they wanted to do. There were also more modern themes which made the movie more interesting such as drugs being given to children and it seems to not also try and pose as a dark film even though it was. I felt that the earlier noir was trying to push too hard to try and be dark that it was almost forced. Even some of the dialog was forced. Also they actually made use of flashbacks something that the other noirs did not use flashbacks which made Brick so much better in my mind. I also felt that Brendan in many ways was smarter than the other guys in the Maltese Falcon and in Touch of Evil. The only problem I had with the movie was that it was in high school and they make it seem like as if these high school children are adults. They do address it though when Brendan is at leader's house and the mom comes and makes Brendan breakfast. It makes it all seem unrealistic.

Maybe it is the time period that these movies took place in but what I do know is that this movie is a good one to watch. I'd give it a 7/10 for educational value and a 9/10 for entertainment.