The Black Dahlia

Movie Title-- The Black Dahlia

Release Year-- 2006

Running Time-- 2 Hours and 1 Minutes

Production Company-- Universal Pictures

Director-- Brian DePalma

Cast-- Josh Hartnett, Aaron Eckhart, Scarlett Johansson, Hillary Swank, Mia Kirshner


Lee Blanchard and Bucky Bleichart are two police officers that find themselves on the scene when the mutilated body of the "Black Dahlia" is found. As they strive to figure out who murdered this woman, they also find that their own lives are falling apart. First and foremost, this movie is based on a book with the same titled of the movie and that book is based off a real case in California. For anyone that doesn't really know anything about "The Black Dahlia", let me tell you a little about her. On January 15, 1947 the body of a 23 year old woman named Elizabeth Short was found in a vacant lot. Most people that passed by didn't think twice about the body laying there because it looked like a mannequin. When it was finally discovered that she was a human, the sight of her was gruesome. She was found mutilated, her body severed in the middle, drained of blood with her intestines, liver, stomach and spleen removed as well as all her reproduction organs removed as well. She was also cut from the corner of her mouth to her ear on each side. She was known as "The Black Dahlia" because of the fact that she wore black, with a large black dahlia flower in her hair. It was also a word play on the movie "The Blue Dahlia" that was released around the same time.

OK, now that you know a little about the woman, let's get to the movie. In my opinion, the movie was only OK. The only true thing about it is that it is based on Elizabeth Short's murder. The Black Dahlia case happened in 1947, so of course the movie is set in Hollywood at the end of the 1940's. I think that time period is so classy and the costumes in the film lived up to that image of "early Hollywood" glamor. The soundtrack of the film is equally glamorous, although some of the scores were a little over done for the parts of the film they put added it to. As for the acting, it was a little flat in this film. Don't get me wrong, the actors did an OK job but there didn't seem to be too much life behind the characters. The only life the characters had was the one that they showed you, they didn't really have much of a background story.


All in all, I am very sure that I won't see this film again. I wanted to see it because the real life case of the Black Dahlia was something that interested me but as for the movie, the only things about her was the fact that she was murdered and the LAPD had a field day trying to figure out the murder. The rest of the movie was pretty much crap. Watch the movie for vintage Hollywood if you have to see this one...it wasn't really interesting enough to see it for any other reason. Until next time, don't forget the popcorn!