Kiss Kiss Bang Bang
Not content with having one troublesome actor, director Shane Black decided to go with the two most troubled in Hollywood. Robert Downey Jr, as talented as he may be, is known to like the white stuff a bit too much, and where do you start with Val Kilmer? With Kiss Kiss, Downey has finally found his niche, having had bit parts in many movies, he finally seems to have found the role that he was born to play, a crook on the run who stumbles into acting…so nothing new there, then. Val Kilmer even surprises with what must be his best role since… well a long time to say the least, as a gay private investigator.
The chemistry between the two leading actors is vital in movie world, and it is nice to see that these two pull it off as successfully as Mel Gibson did with Danny Glover in the Lethal Weapon series. Of course the two pairings have something in common, that being writer/director Shane Black (Black wrote the screenplay for Lethal Weapon).
The plot in Kiss Kiss has more twists and turns in it than an bent corkscrew, and can’t be pinned down into one genre – it has a small amount of everything from comedy to action to romance, but the basic premise is that Lockhart (Downey) is tricked into telling his high school sweetheart that he is a PI. This backfires when her sister is seemingly murdered and she employs the help of Lockhart to track down the killer. Kilmer’s Gay Perry is a real PI who is employed as an expert to the movie industry to teach Lockhart the tricks of the trade.
Kiss Kiss is smart, funny and highly quotable. A must-see for people addicted to addicted movie stars.