Dark City was one hell of a sci-fi movie!It was mind bending with beautiful acting and great special effects!And I'm not just saying this because of Richard. Mostly, but not completely.I have seen this movie 17 times and I can pick out something new each time. Okay...now where to start...Ah! Richard...
Richard played the character of Mr. Hand, one of the many leather and faux fur trimmed trench coat wearing strangers.And where does it go from there? Well, for those of who who haven't seen it, I'll try not to give too much away... but I'll go as far as I can...or want to!So...The title character is John Murdoch. And John wakes up in a hotel with a dead body in his room...the only problem...he can't remember a thing!Then he gets a mysterious phone call and is told (and soon realizes) that a group of men are following him in any way possible and are trying to kill him.Sounds weird? Well...this group of people "own" the city. They put the citizens into a trance at midnight (which is hard to determine)and "tune". In other words, they use their telepathic ability to add to the city and form buildings, etc. So Richard is one of the bald, funky guys out to kill Mr. Murdoch. And you still may be asking "why would they want to kill him?" and I'm getting to that! See, John Murdoch is some freak of nature or step up the evolutionary ladder. He has developed the "strangers'" ability to "tune". And so the strangers don't want him to interfere with there plans so they want to kill him...either that or poses him to find the human soul. The strangers are dying and they think they need to find the soul to survive. (I have another theory though...)So Richard is prancing around looking all hot and having secret desires and stuff so he decides to get John Murdoch's potential memories injected or "imprinted" into his skull. Murdoch does not posess these memories but he has been given clues to figure out his identity. These clues were placed by the strangers in there everlasting cycle of changing and adapting the city. Murdoch was intended to have the memories but he woke up during the tuning. So Mr. Hand takes the memories placed in his head and tries to find Murdoch among the city. Meanwhile Murdoch is trying to find out about himself and why these men are after him. In the end.....I'll just say there is a big fight and it turns out well because Mr. Hand survives.
So now for the acting and Richard portion!One word....EXCELLENT!!!!! Uhmmm...not much more can describe that other than...SEE THIS MOVIE!!!!
RICHARD O'BRIEN (Mr. Hand) was the only actor Alex Proyas ever considered for the part of the silken-voiced Stranger who has himself "imprinted" with John Murdoch's memories in order to hunt Murdoch down.
Richard O'Brien wrote "The Rocky Horror Show" in 1973. After an initial three-week run at the Theatre Upstairs at the Royal Court, with O'Brien in the role of Riff-Raff, the show transferred to the former Essoldo Cinema in the King's Road, where it ran for two years. In total, the show played in London for seven years, has toured the UK in numerous productions and was successfully revived in the West End at the Piccadilly Theatre in 1990.
In 1975 the film The Rocky Horror Picture Show, starring O'Brien as Riff-Raff, Tim Curry as Dr. Frank'n'Furter and Susan Sarandon as Janet, was released by Twentieth Century Fox. Like the stage show, the film quickly became a cult and is still playing in midnight shows all over the world. Comments O'Brien: "I'm very pleased to know that what we created touched some kind of nerve, and I'm delighted that twenty years later people are still enjoying it."
O'Brien's other film credits include Dr. John Doe in Derek Jarman's Jubilee, Batch in The Odd Job, Fico in Flash Gordon, Lord Hampton in Revolution and James in The Wolves of Willoughby Chase.
O'Brien has also written the screenplay for the film Shock Treatment, the BBC televison play "A Hymn for Jim" and the stage plays "Top People" and "Tee Zee and the Lost Race," performed at the Royal Court Theatre.
In the theatre, he has appeared in "The Tooth of Crime" at the Royal Court, "Eastwood Ho" at the Mermaid, in his own play "Top People," as "The Dentist," in "The Little Shop of Horrors" and in "The News" at Paramount City. Last year at the Edinburgh Festival he completed a successful run as his alter ego Mephistopholes Smith in "Disgracefully Yours," a show he created and devised. Following a run at the Comedy Theatre, he took the production on a UK tour.
His television acting work includes his own teleplay "A Hymn for Jim," the series "Dick Francis Thrillers" for Yorkshire TV, "Rushton Illustrated" for ATV and "Robin of Sherwood" for HTV. He also appeared as Rousseau in Dick Clement and Ian la Frenais' series "Full Stretch" and, most recently, in "The Detectives" with Robert Powell and Jasper Carrot.
What the man from the newspaper wrote about Dark City
