The unexpected nerd cred of De Palma's The Black Dahlia

I recently finished James Ellroy's The Black Dahlia. Since I'm a glutton for punishment and it was on Netflix Watch Instantly, I checked out the reviled 2006 Brian DePalma film adaptation.

About the film's content, there's little new to say. The novel was already incomprehensibly plotted in the second half, and while some plot lines were mercifully condensed, the finished version of the film is an hour shorter than the initial edit. Virtually everyone but Aaron Eckhart and Mia Kirshner was miscast (and even Kirshner was nearly ten years too old to play the title character). Because it's a De Palma picture it looks fantastic, but it's still a fairly lousy movie. Granted, it's hard to objectively consider a film when you've just finished reading the source material.

But what's really amusing about The Black Dahlia is its unexpected geek connections. Consider:

- One of the major plot points in the novel and the film is a painting of Gwynplaine, the main character in Victor Hugo's novel The Man Who Laughs. You probably haven't read the book or seen the 1928 film adaptation, but you know what Gwynplaine looks like: he's the visual inspiration for The Joker. Coincidentally, two years after The Black Dahlia's release, Aaron Eckhart would appear as Harvey Dent in The Dark Knight, alongside Heath Ledger as The Joker.

- Screenwriter Josh Friedman created the (underrated) Fox series Terminator: the Sarah Connor Chronicles, and helped meme-ify Snakes on a Plane.

- Fiona Shaw, who played Ramona Linscott, is better known as Petunia Dursley in the Harry Potter films.

- Patrick Fischler, who played Ellis Leow, was a member of the Dharma Initiative on Lost. You know, the guy who wasn't Horace Goodspeed or Radzinsky.

While not explicitly geeky, it's also worth noting that veteran character actor Mike Starr (you probably know him from Dumb and Dumber or the NBC show Ed) has a supporting role, and the Dahlia herself, Mia Kirshner, was Naked Mandy in 24. But it's funny that you can find nerdiness even in a place like crime noir.