The things that leave an impact on a life may not affect someone else. Think back to your first oyster, after living a life of an unadventurous eater. The first time you flew on a plane all by yourself, after living a life hiding behind mom and dad. Your first videogame, your first beer, your first kiss. Each of us can draw a line from that “one” event to the person we are today.
“Kiss Kiss Bang Bang” was the movie that got me into movies. I don’t remember where exactly I watched it; it wasn’t in theaters I don’t even remember it ever coming out. It was probably on a Sunday afternoon, in my room with the shades drawn and a channel like Starz or HBO on. I probably put it on because nothing else was happening, or because I was still waking up. But I watched it. And I loved it.
The movie tells the story of Harry Lockhart (Robert Downey Jr.), a thief from New York who stumbles his way into an acting gig and blows the socks off of the people there. They cast him in a detective movie and send him to Los Angeles where he shadows actual detective Perry Van Shrike. (Val Kilmer) The two witness an actual murder while on a routine recon job, that quickly becomes more then just murder. Meanwhile Perry tries to reconnect with his high school sweetheart Harmony, (Michelle Monaghan) and the movie, from this point on, operates as a who-done-it with the three main characters unraveling the deception of some very high-ranking people in the world.
You could plug in different words into that paragraph and it could do a good job describing about a hundred different films. But the thing that separates “Kiss Kiss Bang Bang” from all the other movies out there was the thing that blew my little kid head. The film was aware of itself. Robert Downey Jr. was the narrator in addition to the main character, and would make self deprecating remarks when the movie was too obvious, or he would point out all the foreshadowing elements and say, “GEE I WONDER WHY WE ARE SHOWING THIS, MIGHT BE IMPORTANT FOR LATER ON. WINK WINK NUDGE NUDGE.”
While that implied just a little bit of cheese, the movie, and director Shane Black, were able to pull it off by having the pacing be quick, and having Robert Downey Jr. and Val Kilmer be totally fucking rad. They had chemistry in this movie. Their dialogue was great and it was just a fucking blast to watch them perform it. Downey Jr. especially was excellent and won my young heart and mind with this performance. I didn’t even know about any of his other movies or his drug and legal problems before this movie, that’s how much of a shut in I was, but I became a fan of his on the spot.
I became a fan because he was funny. The entire movie was funny. I remember laughing and giggling along not because it was loud and crass like a studio comedy, but because it was clever and sharp. It was totally different from films I had watched, or liked in the past. Plus, it wasn’t very popular so I got to, for the first time, extol the virtues of an unknown commodity, and feel like I was just a little more special then everyone else.
This is not the best movie in the world. It is not artsy and doesn’t have a lot of depth. (comparatively) But I feel like this movie, and Downey Jr. and Shane Black did me a favor. They opened up film for me. They showed me that movies can be fun and fast and just really fucking cool. I feel like if “Kiss Kiss Bang Bang” asked me to help it move, I would be obliged to. After all it did for me, it would be the least I could to.
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