Writer-director Robert Towne returns to period Los Angeles, the landscape that inspired his immaculate screenplay for Chinatown, for this suitably noirish adaptation of John Fante’s Depression Era novel.
Ask The Dust casts Colin Farrell as a first generation Italian-American writer holed up in a sleazy flophouse with only a photo of H.L. Mencken for company. Scraping around for nickels and dimes, he happens upon a feisty waitress (Salma Hayek) who becomes his muse, lover and sparring partner.
While there is little of the taut narrative drive that defined Mr. Towne’s most famous script, intense performances and the lushly realised grime make Ask The Dust a worthwhile venture. Those meanwhile, who harbour romantic notions about starving artists clattering away of their typewriters in appalling social circumstance, will be very pleased indeed.
Colin watchers may well be even happier. His slightly clipped American accent fits the highly stylised milieu perfectly and his thespian skills have never been put to better use on screen. Unless we count certain videos on the internet. F’nar, etc…