A Scanner Darkly (2006)

In director/scriptwriter Richard Linklater's visually-incredible black comedy and mind-bending fantasy-sci-fi thriller - adapted from Philip K. Dick's 1977 science-fiction novel; it was a challenging treatise about drug abuse and the war against it in a future dystopic world; the totalitarian society used high-tech surveillance to battle against rampant drug use-addiction and a "Substance D epidemic" (caused by a powerful new drug known as Substance D).

The R-rated film's title was partially derived from the Biblical passage in I Corinthians 13:12: "For now we see through a glass, darkly, but then face to face." The title also referred to the film's use of a scanner surveillance device, employed to uncover problems in the "culture of addiction," and to prompt government agents to spy on citizens and personal friends. Its tagline was: "EVERYTHING IS NOT GOING TO BE OK." The plot was based upon author Dick's own harrowing drug experiences - and possibly reflected only the burned-out, dissociative mind of a dope fiend imagining that he was a narcotics agent.

The film's cautionary plotline told about a semi-distant, totalitarian future where 'Big Brother'-styled surveillance ruled, and a brain-deadening super-drug called Substance D (meaning "slow death") had caused many users to become intensely addicted, hallucinatory and paranoid with split personalities; it was estimated that nearly 20 percent of the population could be classified as addicts. The government had instituted high-tech surveillance on the addicted population and the drug producing and distributing underworld, and hired a number of informants and undercover agents to deal with the invasive problem. Linklater's adapted screenplay of Dick's novel presented a caustic and confusing vision of an unstable world, with blurring identities, characters with multiple names, and shifting and distorted realities due to the rampant use of mind-altering substances.

On a budget of $8.7 million, the film's revenue grosses were $5.5 million (domestic) and $7.6 million (worldwide). The remarkable aspect of the animated, low-budget film was that it was shot in 23 days, but required 18 months of computer-rotoscoping (the live-action footage was converted frame-by-frame with a program known as Rotoshop to turn it into animation); the style was similar to Linklater's technique in his earlier feature film Waking Life (2001). [Note: It was unusual for its graphic depictions of sex and nudity, first a fantasy view of a coffee-shop waitress (Natasha Valdez) seen topless, and another scene of frenzied sexual activity.]:

• during the title credits ("Seven Years From Now" in the future year of 2013), a housemate named Charles Freck (Rory Cochrane) was introduced in a tract home on a cul-de-sac in Anaheim, CA; he was a deranged, heavy drug user and suicidal addict shown vigorously scratching his head, believing that hundreds of aphids had attacked his scalp and entire body; he showered and sprayed himself with bug killer to rid himself of the make-believe crawling creatures, and collected the insects in containers
• the house on Mirecrust Street in Anaheim, CA belonged to 38 year old "Bob Arctor" (Keanu Reeves), employed at Handy Brake and Tire; his lazy, loser roommates included two other heavy drug-users: intelligent and college-educated but evil, menacing and sinister Jim Barris (Robert Downey, Jr), and drug-addled, blonde-bearded Ernie Luckman (Woody Harrelson)

At the Brown Bear Lodge in Orange County, CA
Bob Arctor (Keanu Reeves) Acting as Drug Agent 'Fred" - Wearing a Scramble Suit to Blur and Obscure His Identity	Robert Arctor's True Persona Seen Inside His Scramble Suit
[Note: Arctor's name was derived from "Ursus arctos" - the scientific name for the brown bear, and from the star, Arcturus (in the "Bear Keeper" constellation of Bootes).]

• in the opening scene, the schizophrenic Arctor was acting as one of his two separate personalities - as an undercover narcotics cop - code-named Agent 'Fred' (also Keanu Reeves); Arctor was wearing an identity-blurring, shape-shifting 'scramble suit' to protect his true identity and privacy, and to present himself as Agent 'Fred'; every nanosecond, a different avatar image flashed on his body; he was introduced before delivering an afternoon lecture to the "Gentlemen of the Anaheim 709th chapter of the Brown Bear Lodge" in Orange County, CA; the organization (symbolized by a brown bear pictured on the California State flag) was backed by the New Path Recovery Center, one company fully dedicated to solving the nation's drug crisis
• during his talk, Agent 'Fred' described his main job of "tracking down dealers and the source of their illegal drugs"; he told how the super-drug known as Substance D was derived from a "small, highly toxic flower"; he claimed that the D stood for dumbness, despair, desertion, and death; at the end of his speech, it became clear that Arctor - who was posing as an undercover crime fighting agent, had become seriously affected by his own addiction to the deadly Substance D; the drugs' effects on his mind were the reason he had created his split personality between Agent 'Fred' and Bob Arctor
• Arctor had fallen in love with his cocaine-addicted, drug-dealing girlfriend Donna Hawthorne (Winona Ryder) who was selling him Substance D; from police headquarters through tilted information scanner screens, Arctor's phone call with Donna to purchase more drugs was tracked by the police through scanners and facial recognition, but the police (knowing his alter-identity as an agent) declined to arrest him

Police Tracking Robert Arctor Purchasing Drugs by Phone From Donna Hawthorne [Trivia: Anaheim was spelled wrong, and its Zip Code 98345 was inaccurate]

• in a coffee-shop, drug-addicted Freck and his housemate Jim Barris were discussing random issues; Freck feared turning himself in to the New Path clinic-center for rehab, while Barris was pessimistic about the world: "This is a world getting progressively worse. Can we not agree on that?"; to illustrate Freck's distracted and confused mind, when asking about dessert choices from waitress Betty (Natasha Valdez), he imagined her stripping off her uniform and revealing her breasts to him; he worried that he might have to abruptly end his addictive use of Substance D: "I heard you have to go cold turkey"; Barris worried that Freck had already become seriously psychotic: "These visions of bugs, they're just garden-variety psychosis, but a clear indication that you've hurdled over the initial fun and euphoric phase and passed on to the next phase"

Coffee-Shop Sequence: Freck with House-mate Jim Barris
Housemate Jim Barris (Robert Downey, Jr)	Charles Freck - a Heavy Drug-Using Addict	Freck's Fantasy Delusion of Waitress

• after a quick stop in a convenience store (seen on sped-up fast-forward video footage), Barris and Freck returned to their residence on Mirecrust Street; in his home drug lab, Barris was attempting to synthesize a stronger and purer version of cocaine through repeated filtering and experimentation
• following his lecture at the Lodge, agent 'Fred' drove to his Orange County precinct office, to report his findings from the underworld to his senior officer-boss 'Hank' - both were wearing 'scramble suits' to maintain their anonymity; Fred agreed that New Path would be a "a good place for a dealer to hide" because the facility was not allowed to use scanners
• agent Fred explained how he had been called upon to spy on Donna and learn the identity of her bigger drug supplier: ("Matter of time before she's hooking me up with the next person up the ladder"); as a drug agent, he had also been called upon to reluctantly spy on his drug-using housemate-friends including Barris, Freck, and Luckman, who were also suffering from delusional paranoia with homicidal tendencies
• and then to his surprise, Agent 'Fred' was also officially ordered by 'Hank' to investigate Arctor - Himself! ("I'm officially assigning you to observe Arctor"); a recent tip from an informant had brought suspicion to Arctor; Arctor's house in Anaheim would be equipped with a newly-installed 24/7 holographic scanning system (consisting of surveillance cameras to record tapes of illicit activity)
• due to his lecture performance, Agent 'Fred' was questioned by two medical deputies (Chamblee Ferguson and Angela Rawna) in the police precinct, who tested whether he might be slowly losing his own identity, burning out, becoming paranoid, having cognitive brain issues or bilateral dysfunction (known as "cross-chatter'), and acting psychotic and crazy; he was considered to have a "functional impairment" and needed to "dry out" at New Path before returning to work
• back in Hank's office, Agent "'Fred' was told that Arctor's druggie pal and housemate Jim Barris was the one who was ratting him out with "evidence that Mr. Arctor is part of a covert terrorist drug organization" and was colluding with his girlfriend Donna Hawthorne; Barris reported his suspicions to both 'Hank' and 'Fred,' totally unaware that 'Fred' in the room was his disguised roommate Arctor; Barris stated: "Mr. Arctor is an addict. He is addicted to Substance D. And I fear that his mind has become deranged over time and he is now officially to be considered dangerous"; however, Barris had no evidence to back up his allegations; Barris then backpedaled, stating that Arctor only had a "soul sickness. His brain is damaged from the use of this toxic and most terrible substance"; and then he divulged his real reason to be in the office - he was angling to seek employment; in comparison, Barris appeared more demented than Arctor
• back in the house, Arctor worried about his own mental state and asked himself: "What happened? How'd I get here?" - he envisioned himself in the past as a family man, living in a stuck routine in a typical suburban Southern California house with a wife (Melody Chase) and two young daughters (Eliza Stevens and Sarah Menchaca), but they had long since abandoned him; he was despairing of his entire life: "I hated my life, my house, my family...my backyard, my power mower. Nothing would ever change. Nothing new could ever be expected. It had to end, and it did. Now in the dark world where I dwell, ugly things and surprising things and sometimes little wondrous things spill out at me constantly and I can count on nothing"

Arctor Truly Worried About His Own Addicted, and Confused Split Mental State

Envisioning Himself With a Wife and Two Children

Arctor As a Family Man

• during a road-trip to San Diego with Barris and Luckman, Arctor's gas pedal stuck and they accelerated down the freeway before bringing the car to a halt; the threesome began to suspect that Substance D was screwing up their lives, although Barris deflected blame about the car tampering: "Substance D cannot screw up an accelerator, or a carb-idle adjustment"; as the car was being towed, the paranoia-stricken Luckman came up with a conspiracy theory: "This proves you got somebody out to get you real bad, Bob"; once back home during a sequence of hilarious stoner dialogue about Barris' stolen bicycle, the twitchy and ultra-paranoid Barris also wildly speculated that in their absence, drugs had been planted to set them up and the house was bugged, and went so far as to suggest that Arctor now had to sell the house; his claim that there were signs of an intrusion were proven false, when Arctor's girlfriend Donna emerged from the back bedroom; all of their crazed delusions about what might have transpired in their absence were in question and Arctor admitted to Donna: "Yeah, we're all dreaming"
• in the police precinct, Hank described to Agent 'Fred' how the "holo" scanning system covertly installed in Arctor's house was transmitting back information from its surveillance cameras - implicitly to find evidence of illicit drug activity; Agent 'Fred' was to monitor his own house and report on himself: ('Hank': "Arctor is hiding a great deal...The guy is a phony. So keep on him until he drops until we have enough to arrest him and make it stick"); 'Fred' admitted: "I'd say Arctor is doomed if he's up to something. And I have a hunch, from what you're saying, that he is"
• due to his addled brain, Freck was becoming more and more disturbed, crazed, and paranoid, although he projected his condition onto his roommates as he drove off: "See, you guys are f--ked up"
• in his living room that evening, Arctor was experiencing hallucinatory visions of Barris and Luckman as full-sized cockroaches on the couch; the theme of falsely posing as an imposter or changing identities was casually mentioned by Luckman, who referenced Leonardo DiCaprio's movie Catch Me If You Can (2002); their conversation about 'narc' imposters was actually a 'live feed' that was being viewed by Agent 'Fred' in the police station; during the viewing, 'Fred' ingested three red pills of Substance D, and watched as the insensitive Barris idly sat by and passively watched Luckman's clear distress of choking to death while eating a TV dinner
• a voice-over (Leif Anders) described Freck's failed suicide: "Charles Freck, becoming progressively more and more depressed by what was happening around him, decided finally to off himself...Instead of quietly suffocating, Charles Freck began to hallucinate"; his suicide attempt failed when he ingested downer hallucinogens with a glass of expensive Azalea Springs Merlot wine instead of poison; a strange Creature (Turk Pipkin) appeared by his bed to read to him for eternity a massive scrolling list of "The Sins of Freck"
• Arctor's girlfriend Donna picked him up after his shift at the police precinct, and was assured that he had the money for the drugs he wanted; she felt his close association with the distrustful Barris was making him crazy: "And when you're around him, you start acting crazy"; she drove to her place for a drug exchange and he "dropped" some Death pills (Substance D), plus they had some Tequila; but then she coldly refused his overtures for sex and physical contact with him, claiming her rejection was due to her own excessive coke use; Donna asserted: "Look, I do a lot of coke. OK. And I just have to be really careful because I do a lot of coke, so just leave my body alone. OK?...I just don't like it when people grope my body and I have to watch out for that because I snort so much coke"; he was upset with her: "That's f--king lame. I gotta go"; outside, she apologized for hurting his feelings; when he asked how much coke she was doing, she replied: "Not that much," but then confessed she had a "habit" but was "happy" nonetheless

Arctor With His Girlfriend Donna

Donna Rejected Arctor's Romantic Advances: "Leave my body alone, OK?"

Donna Apologizing For Hurting His Feelings

• instead, Arctor pursued sex with a young "Substance D prostitute" or blonde junkie named Connie (Lisa Marie Newmyer) after being rejected by Donna; before sex, he shared three red pills with her and took a handful of pills himself; as he rolled over in bed after having sex with Connie, he momentarily freaked out when he imagined not Connie, but dark-haired Donna next to him - and he began to question his sanity

Arctor After Sex with Blonde Junkie Prostitute Connie	Arctor Freaked Out Momentarily - Donna Was in Bed With Him	Dark-Haired Donna Reverted Back Into Blonde-Haired Connie
Fast-Forwarding of Scanned Surveillance Footage of Arctor's Sexual Encounter with Connie

• at work in front of his surveillance monitor, Agent 'Fred' was phoned and asked to submit to more evaluations and tests of his mental condition in Room 203; he was specifically asked about confusion, difficulty identifying persons or objects, and language disorientation; before leaving his desk, 'Fred' scanned fast-forwarded footage of Arctor's sexual encounter with Connie on his six surveillance screens that showed him (in the top three screens) having sex in multiple positions with Connie in fast-motion; fascinated, he was able to grab some of the footage, enlarge it, and create a short looped movie of Connie morphing into Donna and then back to Connie
• Agent 'Fred' was again tested in Room 203 by two male medical officers (Wilbur Penn and Ken Webster); a further test of his brain hemispheres was administered using object recognition through touch while he was blindfolded; he was questioned to see if he could distinguish whether the object placed in his left hand was identical or not to the object in his right hand; the technicians also asked for an updated blood test; one technician asked if he was more depressed than before
• as Arctor entered his home, he thought about how his "rundown, rubble-filled house with its weed-patch yard" was a waste of a "truly good house" that could be put to better use with a family and children; he also wondered about the spying scanners installed in his home: "Whatever it is that's watching, it's not human"; he delivered one of the most important monologues of the film: "What does a scanner see? Into the head? Down into the heart? Does it see into me, into us? Clearly or darkly? I hope it sees clearly, because I can't any longer see into myself. I see only murk. I hope for everyone's sake the scanners do better. Because if the scanner sees only darkly, the way I do, then I'm cursed and cursed again. And we'll only wind up dead this way, knowing very little and getting that little fragment wrong too"
• back at work, Arctor was given the results of his brain tests - his two brain hemispheres were competing or interfering with each other, "carrying conflicting information. It's as if you have two fuel gauges on your car. They're studying the same amount of fuel, but one says your tank is full, the other registers empty. They can't both be right"; the cause of his dysfunctional brain was due to his excessive use of Substance D; the split-brain phenomenon was known as "cross-cutting"; it was uncertain if the damage was organically permanent, or would heal itself over time (if he stopped taking Substance D)
• in 'Hank's' office, Agent 'Fred' listened in as Barris accused him (Arctor) and his drug-dealing girlfriend Donna Hawthorne as being leaders of a terrorist cell; 'Hank' explained that Barris' notebook and voice recorder would be impounded while the veracity of his information was checked, and he wouldn't be released from custody in order to keep him on hand - and as a formality, he would be charged with "knowingly giving the authorities false information"
• once Barris was taken away, 'Hank' told 'Fred' that Barris' evidence was "fake" and "worthless"; 'Fred's' medical results also indicated that his brain was so damaged that he was "completely bonkers" due to his voluntary use and abuse of Substance D: ("No one held a gun to your head and shot you up"), and that he would be reprimanded and disciplined - "subject to a misdemeanor charge, a fine, and/or six months"
• it soon became apparent that it was part of a pre-arranged plan to have Arctor become so addicted that he would have to be committed to the New Path Recovery Center; Arctor seemed surprised when 'Hank' revealed to "Fred" that he had long known that he was Arctor, and that the real reason for the narcotics police surveillance was to set up Barris and apprehend him: ("We're really interested in Barris, not you. The whole scanning of the house was to keep an eye on him. We hoped to draw him here, and we did. He is deep into it with some very dangerous people....he grew progressively more and more suspicious that you were an undercover cop trying to nail him or use him to get high or - so he did what you or anyone would have done"); Arctor had been deliberately recruited to function as a narcotics agent who would then be exposed and addicted to the Substance D drug; without his knowledge, the government used him to set up and arrest Barris, and as an addict, he would then be further used to gather incriminating evidence at New Path about their Substance D farms
• the film's biggest plot twist was then unveiled - 'Hank' phoned Donna to come to the police precinct, to pick up Arctor in five minutes and take him to New Path; 'Hank' stepped out of his office, entered a private room, and removed his scramble suit to reveal that he was Donna!; on their drive to New Path, Donna commiserated with a devastated Arctor: "You're a good man, Bob. You've been dealt a bad deal," and promised that he would be healed and restored: ("Some day, a long time from now, you'll see the way you saw before"); Arctor collapsed on the lobby floor of the center, puking and sick
• after a short while at the therapeutic, rehab and residence facility in Santa Ana, Arctor was transferred to the New Path farm to work outdoors with plants, reportedly for his own good; upon his arrival, he was told that he would assume a new name - 'Bruce'; he was assigned to live in a cell marked 4-G; he was told that he wouldn't be returning to the rehab facility to see acquaintances, but might return to visit during gatherings at Christmas and Thanksgiving
• in a booth of a General Burger fast-food restaurant, Donna (now code-named 'Audrey') met with her fellow undercover agent and police officer 'Mike' (Dameon Clarke) (working inside New Path); they discussed how the addicted 'Bruce' ("a burnt-out husk") was their only way to infiltrate into the workings of New Path; they could then prove their case, once 'Bruce' was fully hooked and could produce evidence against it, that New Path was manufacturing and distributing the addictive substance: (Mike: "It matters when we can prove that New Path is the one growing, manufacturing and distributing"), including a blue flower used to manufacture Substance D; Mike further claimed: "...there's no other way to get in there. I couldn't, and think how long I tried. They got that place locked up tight. They're only gonna let a burnt-out husk like Bruce in. Harmless. You have to be, or they won't take the risk"

Donna Hawthorne/'Audrey'	'Audrey's' Fellow Undercover Agent 'Mike' (Dameon Clarke)
'Audrey' and 'Mike' Discussing Using 'Bruce' To Infiltrate Into the New Path Farm

• however, Donna/'Audrey' was worried that she had caused her former boyfriend 'Bruce's' addiction; it was quite a cost to pay for their undercover work to shut down New Path; she was concerned that Bob /'Bruce' had been selected and sacrificed - without his knowledge, to become a drug addict, and was doubtful that 'Bruce' would ever recover from his split personality and regain his former self: ("Yeah, but to sacrifice someone, a living person, without them ever knowing it. I mean, if he'd understood, if he had volunteered, but he doesn't know and he never did. He didn't volunteer for this... It wasn't his job to get addicted"); she assertively worried: "Look, Mike, I gotta get out. I can't do this again. I want it to end...We are colder than they are"
• Mike espoused 'Bruce's' sacrificial mission to Donna, to gather incriminating evidence on New Path's D-farms - although Arctor's mission might never be fully acknowledged as nothing more than a minor footnote: "I believe God's M.O. is to transmute evil into good and if he's active here, he's doing that now, although our eyes can't perceive it. The whole process is hidden beneath the surface of our reality, and will only be revealed later. And even then, the people of the future, our children's children will never truly know this awful time that we have gone through and the losses we took. Well, maybe some footnote in a minor history book. A brief mention with no list of the fallen"
• out at the isolated New Path farm facility as 'Bruce' was working outdoors spraying weed killer, he knelt down and momentarily saw blue flowers hidden and growing in-between rows of corn in the field [Note: the flower was known as "Clerodendron Ugandens," a real flower native to Africa, and poisonous to livestock as well as humans.]; the well-dressed New Path Farm Manager (Jason Douglas) stood towering above 'Bruce' and smugly mentioned how the blue plants were "the flower of the future" - but cautioned that the plant wasn't for 'Bruce' anymore: "But not for you, Bruce.... you've had too much of a good thing already. Get up, get up. Stop worshipping. This isn't your God anymore, although it once was"
• afterwards, 'Bruce' reacted by commenting to himself: "I saw Death rising from the earth, from the ground itself in one blue field"; he plucked one sample to take with him to give to his friends (as evidence for the authorities? or as a gift?) - he hid it in his boot to later give to his friends during the next holiday: "A present for my friends at Thanksgiving"
• the film ended with a tragic epilogue from author Philip K. Dick: "This has been a story about people who were punished entirely too much for what they did. I loved them all. Here is a list, to whom I dedicate my love." It listed fifteen individuals by name (one of whom was "Phil" himself) who were deceased or suffered brain damage, vascular damage, or psychosis due to drug abuse; it became the "footnote" mentioned earlier by 'Mike': "In memoriam. These were comrades whom I had; there are no better. They remain in my mind, and the enemy will never be forgiven. The 'enemy' was their mistake in playing. Let them play again, in some other way, and let them be happy"