If there are two types of movies that have been done to death, it's noir pastiche and high school movies. But, in one of the great bits of movie alchemy, Rian Johnson takes these two subgenres and smashes them up with the reckless abandon of someone who doesn't seem to care if anyone likes it or not, even though we all know that's impossible.

Johnson and the cast are all smart enough to know that a conceit like this will…

A modern day film noir, but at high school with teenagers. And surprisingly, it works.

Do you remember what high school was like? That was the whole universe. There was nothing beyond it. Nothing. The way the film utilizes these desolate sports fields and empty car parks, as if to suggest there is no life and no world beyond the California hills that frame nearly every setting...clever stuff. There is also the complete lack of the adult beyond the most…

Some people salivate over Christopher Nolan. Some people hold Joss Whedon as God's gift to cinema. Others may think worlds of PTA, Scorsese, or Kubrick and that none of those directors can do wrong. That is all well and good, but my inner movie fanboyism is pointed at someone else.

With just three films under his belt, no one excites me more these days than Rian Johnson. All three of his movies have a bold, staunch vision that doesn't compromise…

Rian Johnson's directorial debut Brick really was a breath of fresh air. A unique experience and thoroughly captivating. It's a crime drama set in a school with a bunch of teenagers, but its neo-noir style lifts this above and beyond any fear of it being "just another teen drama". It has a great use of language and terms very reminiscent of 1930's film noir. Sometimes a little difficult to follow but thats half its charm and compliments the mystery to…

As a huge fan of film noir, I love the idea of taking the elements of the genre and placing them in a completely foreign context: high school. I tend to really love high school movies as well, so I should've loved Brick, right? Although I appreciate the originality and vision of Rian Johnson's debut feature, something about it doesn't resonate with me quite as strongly as it does other people. I can't pinpoint anything about it that is overtly…

A near impossible shroud of cool exists around Brick, an intangible sense of hyper-real style in the manner of speech, the setting and the characters that populate it. Rian Johnson, with his debut feature, delivers a truly fresh and unique take on the hard-boiled noir - his isn't set in smoky bars, detective offices or gangland dens, rather high school baseball fields, principals offices and suburban basements. It should be a comedy, it should come across utterly ridiculous, but Johnson…

''Throw one at me if you want, hash head. I've got all five senses and I slept last night, that puts me six up on the lot of you.''

A high school noir film really shouldn't work without being an immature mess, but thanks to one Rian Johnson 'Brick' does, its as enthralling as it is entertaining and mysterious as it is intelligent, you can never really be sure of anything in this film, but if one thing is for…