Line #134 Film/StrangeDays


1	[[quoteright:346:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/unnamed_5_5.jpg]]
2	[[caption-width-right:346:[[{{Tagline}} You know you want it]].]]
3
4	->''Memories are meant to fade, Lenny. They're designed that way for a reason.''
5	-->-- '''Mace'''
6
7	''Strange Days'' is a 1995 CyberPunk ScienceFiction movie written by Creator/JamesCameron and Jay Cocks, directed by Creator/KathrynBigelow and starring Creator/RalphFiennes, Creator/AngelaBassett, and Creator/JulietteLewis.
8
9	Lenny Nero (Fiennes) is a grungy ex-cop eking out a lonely, miserable existence in the urban nightmare that is 1999 Los Angeles by dealing in dreams. He sells illegal "SQUID" recordings that allow the user to directly experience moments from people's lives as if they were actually there, living every sight, sound, thought, and feeling that the person doing the recording experiences. This allows the user to experience anything - sex, drugs, and even death. Although charming and suave on the surface, Lenny is [[StepfordSmiler deeply unhappy and pathetic]], addicted to his own product, and desperately reliving the happy moments from his long-dead relationship with his ex-girlfriend Faith Justin (Lewis), a rising punk musician whom he saved from the gutter, only for her to discard him when she began to make it big. The only two of his few remaining friends who don't regard him as a washed-up loser are Lornette "Mace" Mason (Bassett), a bodyguard and chauffeur, and Max Peltier (Creator/TomSizemore), a paranoid and cynical PI with ambiguous morality.
10
11	Lenny's life, such as it is, begins to ''completely'' fall apart a few days before the millennium celebrations when he anonymously receives a snuff recording that depicts the agonizing rape-murder of a prostitute he is acquainted with, whom he encountered hours before her death. Because she attempted to warn him of something concerning Faith, Lenny begins to suspect that Faith is the next target...
12
13	----
14	!!This film provides examples of:
15	* AbhorrentAdmirer: Mace surmises that the SerialKiller sends Lenny the recordings because the killer sees Lenny as an exemplar of SQUID. [[spoiler: She's wrong -- Max [[IShallTauntYou just wants to mock]] his employer.]]
16	* AccentSlipUp: When Philo slips from a generic Transatlantic accent into a more Cockney one while raging at Lenny. (Michael Wincott, the actor playing Philo, is actually Canadian.)
17	* ActionGirl: Mace, who is a bodyguard/limo driver. It pretty much takes an entire police [=SWAT=] team to kick her ass. Also an ActionMom.
18	* AllThereInTheManual: Creator/JamesCameron's "scriptment" (he started out to write a treatment, but it evolved into a script as he went along) was later published separately, and fills in a lot of background detail.
19	* AndIMustScream: A SQUID deck fitted with a special amplifier can virtually lobotomize people. Since the victims are left technically alive, such incidents aren't treated as homicides, even if foul play is suspected.
20	* AssholeVictim: Philo is a SmugSnake and seems to have Faith in some sort of blackmail, even if it's just emotional. [[spoiler: No, Philo is just an asshole and is completely innocent of any wrongdoing, including Faith, who really does love him.]]
21	* AsYouKnow: A radio talk show caller explains how the country has really gone down the toilet in the last few years.
22	* AwLookTheyReallyDoLoveEachOther:
23	** [[spoiler: Lenny and Mace, though for much of the film, it's obvious Mace is carrying a torch for him]].
24	* AxCrazy: Officer Steckler is clearly not a very well-adjusted individual. [[spoiler: Neither is Max, it turns out]]. Lampshaded when Lenny, during his profile of the killer, points out that by his actions in raping and murdering a woman and forcing her to experience what he's experiencing as he does so, the killer is clearly insane but staged the crime to look like a random thrill-seeking sex crime because he thinks that he ''isn't''.
25	* BadassInANiceSuit: Mace in her chauffeur/bodyguard outfit.
26	* BaldOfEvil: [[spoiler: Max, after it's revealed he's a psychotic rapist who wears a wig fitted with a SQUID recorder]].
27	* BetterToDieThanBeKilled: [[spoiler: Engleman [[DrivenToSuicide commits suicide]] after Commissioner Strickland orders his arrest.]]
28	* BettyAndVeronica: Played with: Mace, the ass-kicking ActionGirl, is the Betty; Faith, the flaky, emotionally unstable backstabber, is the Veronica. [[spoiler: Mace wins, partly because Faith slept with Lenny's best friend and conspired with him to frame him for murder and partly because she's, well, awesome]].
29	* BigBadEnsemble: [[BigBadDuumvirate Burton Steckler and Dwayne Engelman]], [[spoiler: Philo Gant]], and [[spoiler: Max]].
30	* BodyguardBabes: Mace's cover is being a limo driver, but in reality, she's expected to be her charge's bodyguard.
31	** One of Gant's hired thugs is an impressively muscular blonde woman who takes her own turn beating the hell out of Lenny.
32	* BrokenBird: Faith, when Nero first met her. She was a literal crack whore.
33	* BullyingADragon: [[spoiler: Jeriko One ''really'' should have kept his mouth shut after the cops pulled him over. Granted, Steckler probably still would have shot him anyway, but he might have "just" been beaten]].
34	* ByTheBookCop: Strickland. See Reasonable Authority Figure below.
35	* ByronicHero: Lenny may well be the epitome of this trope.
36	* CassetteFuturism: The film takes place in a dystopian society that was only a few years away from the time of filming. The future aesthetic is mostly conveyed with loud, shiny clothing and punk stylings amongst the hip and degenerate crowd. Information is distributed by hand on discs, without any mention of the Internet.
37	* TheCastShowOff: Creator/JulietteLewis does the vocals for each of her songs in the film (all of which are originally by Music/PJHarvey).
38	* CentralTheme: Letting go of the past. Nero can't even though everyone, including Faith and especially Mace, tells him it's destroying him.
39	-->'''Mace:''' Memories are supposed to fade, Lenny. They're designed like that for a reason.\
40	\
41	'''Faith:''' You know one of the ways that movies are still better than playback? 'Cause the music comes up, there's credits, and you always know when it's over. '''''It's over!'''''
42	* ChekhovsGun: A very subtle one. Lenny and Tick's conversation after the opening wire-trip sequence casually mentions that the Squid recorder survived the fall and its recording is undamaged. [[spoiler: It's left to the viewer to realise that the same will be true of Max's recording after his fall.]]
43	* ChekhovsGunman: Zigzagged. The TV weatherman who's one of Lenny's clients is mentioned by Lenny and Mace early on but nothing more than that. In a deleted scene, it's revealed that it's the weatherman's stolen invites that Lenny uses to get him and Mace into the big party.
44	* ChronicEvidenceRetentionSyndrome: [[spoiler: Max's frame of Lenny would probably have still worked, even after his death - if he hadn't recorded his own confession.]]
45	* ColorBlindConfusion: Evidence is discovered that the killer must be colorblind. It never gets to be a useful clue because the colorblind guy kept it a secret, but serves as a BrickJoke in the final confrontation, where the killer tells the protagonist his color blindness is the only way one can stand the latter's taste in clothing.
46	* CombatPragmatist:
47	** Lenny doesn't fight fair.
48	** [[NeverBringAKnifeToAGunfight Pull a knife on Mace, she'll pull a gun]]. [[NotWithTheSafetyOnYouWont Pull a gun on Mace, she'll trick you into thinking the safety's on, then disarm you and pummel you with it]].
49	* ConcertClimax: Everything comes to a head during Los Angeles's 1999 New Year's celebration.
50	* ConcertKiss: [[spoiler: Lenny and Mace, at the stroke of midnight, January 1st 2000]].
51	* CoolestClubEver: Retinal Fetish. A CyberPunk movie, indeed.
52	* CrapsackWorld: The 1992 Los Angeles riots set a trend toward increased crime, anger, and police brutality to the point that by 1999, America is practically a warzone.
53	--> Creator/JamesCameron: [[WordOfGod Things got bad for a while...]] [[FromBadToWorse then they got worse]].
54	* CrouchingMoronHiddenBadass: Lenny tends to pretend to be cowardly to make his opponent underestimate him. Just ask a bouncer. Lenny ''used to be a street cop'', after all. There's some subtle foreshadowing, as he ''lets'' the bouncer hit him anywhere but the face -- because he can take a body blow easily.
55	* CruelAndUnusualDeath: [[spoiler: Iris's is exceptionally cruel. She gets chased, tied to a doorknob, stripped and blindfolded, and then her attacker outfits her with a squid, then rapes and strangles her so that she gets doubly humiliated by being made to feel everything he's feeling.]]
56	* CyberPunk: The film is a cyberpunk story notable for being set in the very near future, with only minor advances in overall technology.
57	* DarkActionGirl: One of Gant's three thugs is a muscular woman.
58	* DeadArtistsAreBetter: discussed
59	-->'''Lenny:''' Too bad about your guy Jeriko... well don't worry: his records will sell out now he's dead
60	* DeathByIrony: [[spoiler: Max dies when Nero cuts off the tie Max had been mocking earlier, using the same knife Max tried to kill Lenny with moments before to do so.]]
61	* DeceasedFallGuyGambit: [[spoiler: Attempted by Max]].
62	* DesignatedGirlFight: Averted. Lenny takes her out instead.
63	* DisneyVillainDeath: [[spoiler: Max]].
64	* DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything: Lenny comes off as a cross between a drug dealer and a pimp at the start of the movie. You'd never think that he was an ex-cop (ex-vice, for that matter).
65	* DeusExMachina: The riot started when Mace gets beaten on by a SWAT team dissipates almost immediately as the Police Commissioner arrives with an anti-riot brigade. His possible support ''was'', however, set up in a prior scene.
66	* DirtyCop: Steckler and Engelman. [[spoiler: Also, what Max really is.]]
67	* DisposableSexWorker: {{Lampshaded}} after the murder of [[spoiler:Iris]].
68	-->'''Lenny:''' Cops are lazy, and they know that no one cares about a dead hooker. I mean, they're roadkill, right? They'll make some jokes, they'll eat some donuts...
69	* EarnYourHappyEnding: The film does manage to end on a relatively high note, with Lenny getting the right girl, the bad guys getting killed, and a worse riot averted.
70	* ElectricInstantGratification: Deconstructed.
71	-->'''Lenny:''' This is not like "TV-only-better"... this is life.
72	* EveryoneHasStandards: Lenny refuses to deal in snuff films.
73	* EvilVersusEvil: Crooked cops [[spoiler: Steckler and Engelman]] vs. sleazy music producer [[spoiler: Philo Gant]]. They both want [[spoiler: Iris's]] SQUID recording for their own different reasons. And, of course, [[spoiler: Max]] is playing the whole situation to his own advantage.
74	* {{Expy}}: Jeriko One, despite not resembling him, is meant to be one to Music/TupacShakur.
75	* FailedFutureForecast: When it was written it was set TwentyMinutesIntoTheFuture so it didn't start as an alternate history, but the turn of the millennium came and went by without the societal upheavals depicted in the film.
76	** A news broadcast mentions that predictions for the new millennium include Turkey recognizing the Armenian genocide, and the United States being on its second female president by 2025. Neither came close to coming true.
77	* FanDisservice: A rape and murder scene featuring nudity is still a rape and murder scene. Lenny's [[VomitIndiscretionShot reaction]] pretty much conveys the feelings of the audience[[note]]We ''hope''[[/note]].
78	* {{Fanservice}}:
79	** Creator/JulietteLewis spends quite a bit of her on-screen time with her panties visible and her top off.
80	** There's also a scene demonstrating the more pornographic applications of SQUID via a brief [[GirlOnGirlIsHot girl-on-girl scene]] featuring genuine porn stars Kylie Ireland and Dru Berrymore.
81	** Then there's Angela Basset in an ''incredible'' - and incredibly ''short'' - cocktail dress at the end. Also, for those who enjoy women in power suits, she wears one -- and well -- throughout much of the movie.
82	** Ralph Fiennes playing the fashion plate Lenny also gives no shortage of fanservice, assuming you like a certain disheveled grunginess.
83	* FantasticDrug: SQUID recordings are treated as such -- dealing them is illegal, and addicts can become solipsistic. It's legal in other parts of the world.
84	* FateWorseThanDeath:
85	** Tick, Lenny's recording expert, gets his frontal brain lobes cooked off. Technically alive, but now totally cut off from the outside world.
86	** A similar fate happens to [[spoiler:Philo Gant]], but [[spoiler: Max shoots him in the head later, killing him for real]].
87	* FemmeFatale: Faith.
88	* FingerFraming: When he first appears in the film, Max is FingerFraming the approaching Lenny. This turns out to be something of a ChekhovsGun.
89	* ForWantOfANail: At the start of the film Iris frantically tries to phone Lenny [[spoiler: after witnessing the two cops kill Jeriko One.]] If Lenny had got in just a couple of minutes earlier and been able to answer Iris on the phone, who knows what might have happened?
90	* {{Foreshadowing}}: Mace notes whoever sent Lenny the rape tape knew who he was and wanted to show off. [[spoiler: Max created and sent it.]]
91	** Lenny reacts to the rape tape by screaming, crying, and projectile vomiting. [[spoiler: Max’s reaction by comparison is ''much'' more subdued with only a few twitches and feeble moaning.]]
92	** Max mentions suffering a bullet "floating in the back of (his) brain pan," which led to his retirement from the police. [[spoiler: In a later scene, when Tick is analyzing the blackjack clip of Iris's death, he notes that the killer who recorded had "some sort of trauma" to the brain. It's a clue that Max is the killer that viewers can easily miss.]]
93	** Another one that is a subtle detail and is missed is this: [[spoiler: When Max comments about Lenny's tie when we're first introduced to him, he holds his hands up and frames the tie like a director holding up their hands to frame a shot. In the recording of Iris's death that was sent to Lenny, the killer opens Iris's eyes and then holds their hands up in the same way.]]
94	* ForcedToWatch: Iris's killer uses a SQUID recorder with a signal splitter to force her to see and experience her own rape and murder from his perspective. It later looks like the same fate befell Faith [[spoiler: until it turns out that it was (initially) consensual.]]
95	* FourTemperamentEnsemble: Mace (choleric), Lenny (melancholic), Iris (phlegmatic), and Faith (sanguine).
96	* FriendsAllAlong: Max's introduction plays out this way. [[spoiler: It doesn't last, though]].
97	* GambitPileup: At one point, it looks like everyone except Lenny, Mace, and Max are running some kind of complicated scheme, which are all crashing together to cause chaos. [[spoiler: Turns out that most of them aren't, but Max is running his own Evil Plan]].
98	* GenderBender: Wearing a SQUID allows users to enjoy sex as the opposite sex.
99	* GirlOnGirlIsHot: Exploited by Lenny, who is seen reviewing a lesbian memory created by two gorgeous girls. He gives tips to the girl in view about how to make the scene more erotic.
100	* GivingThemTheStrip: Lenny cuts his necktie to avoid being pulled off the balcony along with [[spoiler: Max]].
101	* GovernmentConspiracy: [[spoiler: Subverted. Max claims that there's a government conspiracy being enforced by "death squads," but he just made the whole thing up to throw Lenny off the scent. It's a much smaller and more private crime]].
102	* GratuitousJapanese: Subverted when Lenny greets a Japanese businessman with "Konbanwa" (good evening) instead of the generic - and incorrect - "Konnichiwa" (good day).
103	* {{Grunge}}: The music played by Faith, who is sort of a pastiche of Music/CourtneyLove.
104	* GuileHero: Lenny.
105	* HandOfDeath: Seen during the murderer's POV tapes. His identity is spoiled by his sleeves rather early for astute watchers.
106	* HellBentForLeather: Lenny spends much of the film in a pair of leather trousers to go with his rough-looking jacket.
107	* HellishLA: Los Angeles on New Year's Eve 1999 is a city where racial tensions are boiling over after the popular rapper Jeriko One is assassinated for his activism. The protagonists are trying to both bring the {{Dirty Cop}}s responsible to justice and prevent the evidence from getting out and starting a riot.
108	* HeroicBSOD: Mace, just for a moment, when despite all their efforts, it appears that the riot to end all riots has started...
109	* HiddenDepths: Lenny is introduced as an AntiHero, a {{slimeball}}, deadbeat pusher in an obnoxious suit, but it's eventually revealed that he's a former police officer with a rather sad past.
110	* HoistByHisOwnPetard: [[spoiler: Lenny manages to kill Max using the switchblade Max sticks in his back]].
111	* IAmNotLeftHanded: [[spoiler: Lenny pretends to be a coward and a bad fighter, but a clue he's not is when he tells the larger bouncer not to hit him in the face -- he can ''take a body blow'' but doesn't want any physical evidence of being hit. Later, when he needs it, he takes the bouncer out quickly and efficiently.]]
112	* ICantBelieveItsNotHeroin: "Jacking in" is analogous to drug use, and unlike most examples of this trope, it ''is'' illegal.
113	* IWantMyBelovedToBeHappy: Played with -- Mace evidently does not give a toss about Faith and is quick to remind Lenny that it's all over between the two of them. Nevertheless, she ultimately ends up helping him in his efforts to protect/win her.
114	* InformedAbility: Jeriko One is supposed to be the best rapper around, but the one song we hear from him doesn't support the notion very well. A different version of the song is on the movie's soundtrack and is much better than what's heard in the film.
115	* InsaneEqualsViolent: Despite the killer's horrific crimes, one character suggests that he may have a brain tumor interfering with his SQUID signal, bringing into question whether he's actually in control of his actions at all, as tumors can put pressure on brain structures and disrupt their ability to function. A tumor in the occipital lobe, however, is likely to only disrupt visual processing, as the character described.
116	* InsideAComputerSystem: An interesting twist on this trope, the SQUID puts the user in someone else's memories.
117	* {{Irony}}: [[spoiler: Max hates Nero's ties. His tie returns the favor.]]
118	* JapanTakesOverTheWorld: A mild example, but when Nero pulls out the SQUID, the Japanese businessmen show off their vastly improved Japanese-manufactured version of it.
119	* JerkWithAHeartOfGold: Lenny is a criminal who used to be a cop and still has a sense of right and wrong.
120	* JerkAssHasAPoint: Lenny hates Commissioner Strickland but accepts he's not corrupt. When Mace is able to give Strickland the evidence surrounding Jericho One's murder he orders the arrest of the officers involved, to the bewilderment of the other cops who nevertheless carry out his commands.
121	* JustBetweenYouAndMe: "Okay, I feel like I gotta share this with someone because it's just too perfect..."
122	* KnightInSourArmor: Lenny, as he still has a sense of right and wrong -- he just doesn't care about ultimately irrelevant "crimes" like dealing in SQUID.
123	* KillerCop: Steckler and Engelman executed Jeriko One for giving them lip.
124	-->'''Jeriko One:''' You gonna be famous, fucker!\
125	'''Steckler:''' [[PreMortemOneLiner I don't think so]].
126	* KnowWhenToFoldEm: When Mace tries to slip into Gant's party, his three goons stop her. She pummels two of them, and the third simply says, "Enjoy the party!"
127	* LadyInAPowerSuit: Mace wears a severe black one in her job as a bodyguard/limo driver.
128	* LegFocus: The [[MaleGaze camera lingers]] on Mace's legs while she's in her LittleBlackDress.
129	* LastMinuteHookup: [[spoiler: Lenny and Mace, punctuated by a BigDamnKiss at the stroke of midnight for 2000.]]
130	* LetsGetDangerous: Lenny spends most of the movie as an ineffectual, much-disdained ButtMonkey punching bag. Then, towards the end, he seems to remember he used to be a cop and decides to remind everyone else of this.
131	** Firstly, when approaching one of the {{mooks}} who'd previously used him as a punching bag, he delivers his usual smarmy "Can't we talk about this like two reasonable human beings?" CatchPhrase -- and [[CombatPragmatist doesn't even give the guy a chance to respond]] before punching him out, handcuffing him, and taking his pistol.
132	** Secondly, when fighting [[spoiler: Max]], he not only holds his own against a complete psychopath but manages to win out [[spoiler: by ''pulling a knife that had been stabbed into his own back'' out and cutting his tie -- which was the only thing keeping Max from plummeting to his death. Also, we see him worrying before about his tie when he was going to a probable trap. It turns out to save his life]].
133	** Additionally, in a deleted scene, he is shown as able to manipulate his way into gaining exclusive passes to the giant FinalBoss party in under 5 minutes, ''smiling the whole time''.
134	* LittleBlackDress: After spending the entire movie in suits and high-collared shirts and looking badass, we see Mace in a tiny, strappy black minidress. [[SheCleansUpNicely The effect is remarkable]]. It's even hotter that she comes strapped, too.
135	* LodgedBladeRemoval: During a brutal fight at the end with the killer ([[spoiler: Max]]), Lenny gets stabbed in the back before throwing the villain over a balcony; the killer grabs Lenny's tie to attempt a TakingYouWithMe, but Lenny yanks the knife out of himself and slices the tie with it, sending [[spoiler: Max]] plummeting to certain death.
136	* LoveTriangle: [[spoiler: Lenny, Mace, and Faith. Also, Lenny, Faith, and Max.]]
137	* MalcolmXerox: Jeriko One is a combination of UsefulNotes/MalcolmX and Music/TupacShakur.
138	* ManipulativeBastard: Lenny is a heroic-ish one.
139	* MentalShutdown: [[spoiler: When Lenny tries to contact Tick, his SQUID supplier, he finds that Tick has been rendered vegetative by an amplified SQUID device (he describes it as Tick's frontal lobe had been turned into two runny eggs). When Mace asks Max how long it lasts, he quietly says "Forever." Later, when Lenny goes to confront Philo Gant he finds the same thing was done to him.]]
140	* MeaningfulName: Nero, Mace, Faith, Iris, Jeriko One.
141	* MindRape: Done to [[spoiler: Iris]] by [[spoiler: Max]] as she is raped (in the standard way) and murdered. He forces her not only to see everything he sees but to feel everything he's feeling, such as the [[{{Squick}} joy he's getting out of raping her and her own fear amplified through his heightened sexual arousal]]. It's so upsetting that simply playing the recording back causes Lenny to be [[VomitIndiscretionShot violently sick all over the pavement.]]
142	* MurdererPOV: [[spoiler: Iris's]] rape and murder. Subverted and made creepier in that the murderer has the ''victim'' share the POV of ''herself'' getting raped and murdered, and the whole other layer of the murderer sending Lenny the tape so ''he'' can share the victim's POV of the murderer's POV of this. Total NightmareFuel and almost unwatchable.
143	* NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast: A woman called "Mace" is unlikely to be mistaken for a cuddly teddy bear, even before actually seeing her.
144	* NextSundayAD: The film was released in 1995 and takes place in 1999.
145	* NeverBringAKnifeToAGunFight: While trying to get into a party, Mace beats up on Gant's thugs before finally pulling a gun on the knife-wielding female thug. She shrugs and says, [[KnowWhenToFoldEm "Enjoy the party"]].
146	* NoCelebritiesWereHarmed: Jeriko One is basically [[Music/PublicEnemy a hammier Chuck D]].
147	* NotOnTheList: When Lenny Nero tries to get into Retinal Fetish.
148	* NotWithTheSafetyOnYouWont: Mace pulls this on Philo's lead goon, Joey Corto. It distracts him long enough to get punched.
149	* OOCIsSeriousBusiness: Lenny spends most of the film wearing loud, obnoxious suits. For the climax, he changes to a relatively conservative black pinstripe suit with a grey tie to fit in.
150	* TheOner: All of the SQUID recordings are portrayed as one long unbroken shot from a POV cam.
151	* OneEyedShot: The movie begins with a closeup of Fiennes's eye blinking.
152	* PetTheDog:
153	** Lenny isn't a ''bad'' guy, but he is presented as a pretty scummy, sleazy loser for a good part of the movie until we finally learn why Mace is so devoted to him against all odds. [[spoiler: He was the cop who comforted and took care of her son after his father murdered a man while he was in the house, apparently even going so far as to shelter him in another room so he wouldn't see his father being dragged off in handcuffs. Considering that Lenny is a white cop, Mace and her family are black and working-class, and racial tensions and police mistrust are that high in LA, this is not insignificant]].
154	** Lenny's gift for his amputee techie friend (a SQUID recording of running along a beach) also counts, though it also goes toward showing how people can develop an unhealthy fixation on [=SQUIDing=] what they can never have.
155	* PoliceBrutality: Complaints around this have heightened racial tensions in the US during the film, and in particular the plot revolves around an outspoken rapper being killed by two cops, which is inadvertently recorded, with them trying to track down the recording.
156	* PoliceState: America, particularly Los Angeles, has come to resemble this by 1999 in the film's timeline, as pointed out by Jeriko One, whilst still a democracy the widespread rioting coming up to the millenium has created an ongoing state of emergency.
157	* POVCam: All of the SQUID scenes. As noted in the film commentary, ''Strange Days'' pioneered new, up-close POVCam techniques for using headcams.
158	* ProfaneLastWords: This is [[LampshadeHanging lampshaded]] when the villain points out to Lenny that in fatal airplane crashes, the pilot's last words 90% of the time are some variant of "Oh Shit!" just as he's about to shoot Lenny.
159	* ProperlyParanoid: Max, when revealing the existence of the LAPD death squad: "It's not a question of being paranoid, it's whether you're paranoid ''enough''." [[spoiler:Subverted: Max turns out to have [[XanatosSpeedChess made the whole thing up on the spot]] to cover up his own part in the GambitPileup that seems to be crashing all around them]].
160	--> '''Philo''': Paranoia's just reality on a finer scale.
161	* PunchClockVillain: Wade, a former pro footballer who has been reduced to bodyguarding Philo. He's genuinely flattered when Lenny pretends to recognize him but still beats the stuffing out of him.
162	* ReasonableAuthorityFigure: Strickland. According to Lenny, even though he is borderline LawfulStupid, he will do what's right. [[spoiler: He does]], despite Mace's doubts.
163	* RedHerring:
164	** [[spoiler: Max goes on about underground police death squads and Government Conspiracy, but really, it's all just a simple murder by two crooked, racist cops and their desperate attempt to cover their own tracks]].
165	* RippedFromTheHeadlines: The whole "recording of the LAPD breaking the law" plotline owes more than a little to the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rodney_King Rodney King incident]], only in this case, taken up to eleven.
166	* TheRuleOfFirstAdopters: Guess what civilians do with the SQUID technology once it gets out?
167	* RuleOfThree:
168	** There are three wigs with SQUID recorders hidden underneath them; one worn by Iris -- [[spoiler: which is how she recorded Jeriko One's execution]] -- one worn by the actor Lenny pays to appear in one of the videos, [[spoiler: and the third by Max, which is how he's able to record the murders he commits]]. The first two are {{foreshadowing}} for the last one.
169	** Also, the running gag of Lenny trying to bribe people with his Rolex.
170	* RunningGag: Lenny trying to buy his way out of trouble with his (fake) Rolex. It never works.
171	* SadClown: Lenny is always ready with a quip and an ingratiating smirk, but he's a deeply depressed sad sack behind closed doors.
172	* {{Sampling}}: Mace's quote, "Right here, right now!" would later be sampled in Music/{{Fatboy Slim}}'s song also called "Right Here, Right Now."
173	* SexByProxy: The SQUID allows you to share the recorded experience of another person, leading to the obvious conclusion that it can be used to record sex. Lenny deals in a lot of smut as well as some other related merchandise, such as a teenage girl taking a shower.
174	* ShoutOut: Nero quips, "[[WesternAnimation/RockyAndBullwinkle Fan mail from some flounder?]]"
175	* {{Slimeball}}: Lenny is introduced this way, as an obnoxiously dressed pusher who's always trying to get another hustle going. Over the course of the film, it becomes obvious that there's [[HiddenDepths much more to him than he lets on]].
176	* TheSnarkKnight: Lenny.
177	* SnuffFilm: "Blackjack" vids, in which the user jacked in actually experiences the SQUID wearer's death. Lenny has a marked distaste for them and refuses to deal with them. The movie opens with him being annoyed at Tick for bringing him a tape of a robbery that ended with the robber's death because he's going to have to edit the last bit out.
178	* SpiritualSuccessor: To ''Film/{{Brainstorm}}''.
179	* StrawNihilist: Max is constantly coming out with rather pessimistic, Nietzche-esque, pre-pesky whipper-snapper statements. [[spoiler: It's a pretty big clue pointing towards his true nature]].
180	* SuspiciousSkiMask: Iris's attacker in the SnuffFilm wears one as he breaks into an apartment. He even glances into a mirror as he adjusts it over himself to make it fully clear to the audience what he's wearing.
181	* TakingYouWithMe: [[spoiler: Max attempts this on Lenny near the end of their final fight.]]
182	* TheseGlovesAreMadeForKillin: Lenny unwittingly watches a SnuffFilm in the form of a recorded memory of an intruder putting on latex gloves. After the intruder starts to lock pick a door, he assumes he's just watching a typical breaking and entering crime until the intruder breaks into Iris' hotel room and brutally rapes and murders her.
183	** Later in the film, Lenny finds [[spoiler: Philo Gant comatose from an amplified SQUID recording. He is then confronted by Max who is now wearing a pair of the same kind of gloves the intruder that raped and murdered Iris was wearing. Confirming that he and the intruder in the SnuffFilm are the same person.]]
184	* TitledAfterTheSong: The song coming from Tick's van when Lenny, Mace, and Max visit him on New Year's Eve is a cover of Music/TheDoors song "Strange Days", from ''Music/StrangeDays''.
185	* TransferableMemory: The SQUID allows memories to be recorded for others to experience them.
186	* TrappedInASinkingCar: Mace and Lenny get trapped in her limousine when it's dumped off a pier.
187	* UnkemptBeauty: Lenny is a sleazy dealer who spends much of the film with a few days of stubble, greasy hair that looks like it hasn't been washed in days, and looking like what little sleep he's had was in his clothes, which it was on at least one occasion. It still doesn't change that he's played by the dashingly handsome and suave Creator/RalphFiennes.
188	* UnresolvedSexualTension: The film runs on the WillTheyOrWontThey between Lenny and Mace. [[spoiler: They resolve it [[LastMinuteHookup just before the credits roll]].]]
189	* TheUnreveal: Lenny assures Mace that getting into an exclusive New Year's party is "what he does." In the next scene, they're already at the party. The scene where we find out ''how'' they got inside was left on the cutting room floor and later included on the DVD.
190	* VictoriasSecretCompartment: When Mace wears her LittleBlackDress, she keeps a gun strapped on her thigh.
191	* VillainousBreakdown: [[spoiler: After being exposed as Jeriko One's murderer, being arrested, and seeing his partner blow his own brains out rather than face a prison sentence while they were handcuffed together, Officer Steckler is ''not'' happy with Mace]].
192	* VisualPun: Mace ''uses'' mace on a guard dog.
193	* VomitIndiscretionShot: After viewing [[spoiler:[[{{Squick}} the recording of Iris being raped and murdered]]]], Lenny goes tumbling out of the back of Mace's car and vomits messily all over the pavement.
194	* WhatTheHellHero: Mace does this every ten minutes to Nero. [[spoiler: Chiefly because she's in love with him.]]
195	* WorldHalfEmpty: Summed up by the radio talk show at the beginning of the film, describing how everything had gone to hell in the last few years.
196	* XanatosSpeedChess: [[spoiler: Max's story about the LAPD death squad turns out to be one of these]].
197	* YouAreBetterThanYouThinkYouAre:
198	** Mace thinks this of Nero (especially since he comforted her son after his father had committed a murder back when Nero was a police officer.)
199	** Strickland thinks this, too, acting like Nero's disappointed father, which Nero ''really'' doesn't appreciate.
200	* {{Zeerust}}: Leaving aside the fact that SQUID hasn't made an appearance yet, some of the film's fashions look pretty absurd, and there's also a moment with a voice-''transcribing'' answer machine that raises an eyebrow these days. Also, the kind of outspoken gangster rap that the film portrays as part of a major social movement had gone out of style by 2000. Nor was Los Angeles quite the borderline-anarchic urban warzone the movie depicts it as either. Averted with Faith's grunge-style rock, as it was still popular on the underground scene she cavorts in for long after 2000, though by 1995 after Music/KurtCobain's death, people were tired of the nihilism, and grunge stopped being a mainstream force as music ''really'' experimented with different styles throughout the late '90s.

Context Film / StrangeDays