
After a botched robbery, petty crook Harry Lockhart (Robert Downey Jr) is mistaken for an actor and sent to Hollywood to receive training for the role of a private investigator from ‘Gay’ Perry van Shrike (Val Kilmer).
While attending a party, Harry meets his childhood sweetheart Harmony Lane (Michelle Monaghan) and learns of a bitter family feud over a large inheritance.
Before too long, what began as training to play a detective in a movie becomes real when a tangled web emerges involving corpses, hired goons, mistaken identities and a severed finger. Harry may have been offered a big break in Hollywood, but the more he gets involved, the less likely he’ll be alive to enjoy it.
Written and directed by legendary action screenwriter Shane Black (Lethal Weapon, The Long Kiss Goodnight), Kiss Kiss Bang Bang revels in the tropes of noir detective stories while also managing to lampshade those very tropes with some intelligent satire.
Featuring sharp dialogue and stellar performances, Robert Downey Jr credits this film with being the reason he was cast in Iron Man.
‘A self-referential noir-screwball-action movie that never wears out its welcome – although it delights in taking that risk, over and over again’ – The Age
This screening is part of our A Very NFSA Christmas season.
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