MovieChat Forums > Dark City (1998) Discussion > Plot hole: Change in hotel clerk

Plot hole: Change in hotel clerk

posted 12 years ago by bfraser-418-596467
13 replies | jump to latest

Let me start out by saying that I very much enjoy this movie. Perhaps it helps that (back in my movie-going days) I was a big Tarkovsky / Grennaway / Kurasawa fan. In other words, I like visually stunning films, and this one measures up.

But yes, there are plot holes: things that make about as much sense as (pick any Tarkovsky film). Personally, I just ignored them. I was so caught up in the visual opulence of this piece that I didn't let the oversights and inconsistencies bother me.

Nonetheless, I figured I'd point out one that I haven't seen mentioned up until now.

When Murdoch comes downstairs at the start of the movie, the guy at the desk is a balding white guy with a moustache (who reappears in another job later in the movie). When Inspector Bumstead arrives to investigate the murder, the guy at the desk is a large black guy. I understand why the film does this: to puzzle us... to make us wonder why there is a different guy there than before, who claims to have talked to Murdoch, which we know isn't true. Its function is to disorient us, and make us wonder what is going on. Fair enough.

Only one problem: it's still the same "day". There has been no intervening "Tuning" (otherwise John Murdoch would have noticed it), and the Strangers do not (anywhere else in the film) swap people out between "Tunings". How would they? Wouldn't everyone notice? "Hey... don't mind us... we're just going to drag this little guy out of here and put this big guy in his place... you can all just pretend that he was always there." Doesn't really work.

As I said, it didn't spoil the film for me. I understand why that detail is there from the point of view of storytelling. I just thought I'd comment on it.

I think that it's things like this that irritate some sci/fi lovers. Unlike The Matrix, which tried hard to create a completely consistent world (which is pretty easy if everything is inside a machine... free license and all), Dark City tries to create a consistent atmosphere, and sometimes in doing so plays fast and loose with "factual" details. Didn't bother me, because I'm in love with the visual aspect of the film, but I can see how it would irritate others.

[–] moviemonkey81 12 years ago

Tuning is the ability to mentally change reality, reshape the world. Or actually, to use the machines within the city to reshape the world. The syringe the doctor used on people injected memories and changed/created personalities.

The Strangers have an ability to induce sleep, which may not necessarily be related to Tuning. Since they can make people sleep whenever they wish, they could easily swap people out in the middle of the “day” without anyone realizing it.

After the hotel clerk came into the room, and was questioned by the Strangers, Mr. Hand put the him to sleep. It can be assumed that since the cops were speaking to a different clerk, that the Strangers imprinted the new one after the other was put to sleep.

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[–] WavesBeneath 12 years ago

Perfect answer.

It wasn't too hard to understand that part, though, OP.

[–] Crazyfatcat_2000 12 years ago

I agree with moviemonkey. The white clerk walked in on them and witnessed them. It's only logical to assume that after they put him to sleep they switched him with someone else who hadn't seen them.

[–] MadSimian 12 years ago

Plus, aside from skin color, the two people were similar enough that anyone in a city like that would just chalk it up to a case of bad memory. After all, they've not kept the same memories for more than 12 hours at a time so their reliance on what they think they remember would have been instinctually "reluctant".

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[–] sticksstoneswwiv 12 years ago

what they do during the night (when everyone is sleeping) is change the entire city. what they do during the day is make minor adjustments when needed (not redesign entire buildings).

i dont see the problem you have.

[–] polsixe 12 years ago

There is no "day", the strangers don't like sunlight. The city is always dark and time stops at mid nite for the tuning. It would take awhile to make the changes. Somehow time goes from am to pm and most miss out they are only living a 12 hr day.

[–] Bob_Fett 12 years ago

You need to research the meaning of a "plot hole."

[–] Filthy_Giuseppe 11 years ago

You need to research the meaning of a "plot hole."

^ This.

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[–] lokis_angels 11 years ago

I think this isn't a plothole, because it actually is a pretty important aspect of the story from John's point of view: Things change unexplained and therefore don't make sense.

Would this happen in, say, Amélie, or Bougainville, then I would consider it a plothole.

[–] Totemkauf 11 years ago

Every person's mind was so programmed that people usually stuck to whatever routine they had, so I'm sure not a lot of people were involved with the hotel, so after replacing the first guy and maybe wiping a few people in the lobby, there wasn't that much risk of people noticing a different clerk.

[–] jrcanary-1 11 years ago

That's not a plothole the Strangers just put the people in the hotel to sleep and replaced the clerk. They don't need to change the entire city around to do that, they can 'tune' any time they want. Try watching the movie again, it's very self explanatory.

[–] wormholeboy 8 years ago

I agree with the other people who've previously replied that the change in desk clerks doesn't create a plot hole -- the Strangers could have simply put to sleep a few people in the hotel lobby to facilitate the switch. (While the Strangers clearly do most of their work while the City sleeps, they don't seem to be hesitant about intervening during "waking hours" if necessary.) However, there is a plot problem related to the first desk clerk (hereafter, "FDC"). When John meets him later at the newsstand, FDC says, "No days off for good behavior," which John clearly reacts to as a sign that something is strange. However, John wasn't present the previous time FDC said, "No days off for good behavior." FDC made that remark while he was going to clean out John's room at the hotel -- "House rules: three weeks is three weeks. No days off for good behavior."

[–] MadSimian 8 years ago

John wasn't reacting weirdly to him because of what he said. He was reacting weirdly because he recognized the guy as the clerk from the hotel even though the guy was insisting that he'd always worked at the newsstand(something John, and the audience by proxy, knew for a fact was patently false).

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