Why I took it off the list: The fact that the film was written by comics mastermind Alan Moore (Watchmen, V for Vendetta) was enough to make me check this one out.

So, let’s dig in!

Review of The Show (2020)

The Show opens with a crawl through space past the moon, to zoom into Earth, specifically a road outside Northampton, England, where a taxi splashes through a puddle to reveal the film’s title in the ripples. Inside the taxi is the lead character, Fletcher Dennis, a hard-boiled investigator type who’s arrived in the town to look for a man named Tim Mitchum.

Mitchum turns out to be dead, found at a local brothel/pick-up spot, which leads Dennis to investigate the circumstances of his death. It’s also revealed what he’s really looking for: a gold cross necklace which Mitchum stole from an elderly gangster’s daughter.

Along the way, he meets an assortment of eccentric characters, including a librarian who moonlights as a masked vigilante, a chatty morgue attendant, an eccentric musician who performs dressed as Hitler, and a chirpy walking tour guide/landlady. He also comes across 2 boy detectives who act and talk as if they’re in a black and white 50s American noir film.

As he tries to find the piece of jewelry, he falls further and further into a surreal rabbit hole and starts having vivid dreams that point him towards what’s really going on.

Incredibly Inventive Visuals but Convoluted Story

The Show has a dizzyingly dense narrative, filled with red herrings, whip-fast dialogue, and a never-ending parade of bizarre characters. The world is jam-packed full of rich background details including a plethora of faux advertisements that feel ripped directly from a Moore comic strip.

It’s an incredibly stylized and visually inventive film, full of slanted camera angles, neon lighting, and vivid dream sequences, including a chaotic, surreal courtroom scene. The sheer imagination on display is admirable, even when the narrative feels impenetrable, which it often does.

The story is quite hard to keep track of and loses some of its stream and charm towards the end as proceedings become increasingly convoluted. And some of the side plots, including the vigilante librarian, don’t end up going anywhere.

Most of the characters in the film feel like archetypes as none are really fleshed-out beyond fast-talking pawns in the larger mystery, though Tom Burke makes for an appealing lead as the tight-lipped, monosyllabic Dennis. Antonia Campbell-Hughes and Ellie Bamber also stand out as a suspect and the aforementioned landlady, respectively.

Also, Moore himself shows up in a wacky cameo as a famous magician, coiffed and made-up to look like the personification of the moon, and makes a decent impression as an actor.

Final score: 6/10

The Show (2020): Worth Watching?

It depends, The Show is endlessly imaginative in its world-building, characters, and striking visuals, which make it worth a watch alone

However, it all feels a bit overwhelming, and the story is somewhat convoluted and hard to keep track of.