"Where the Truth Lies" features a somewhat disappointingly simple story when one gets right down to it, but there's some nifty storytelling tricks employed along the way to make that not as obvious the entire time--and by the same filmmaker, Atom Egoyan, who had already done similarly impressive narratology with "The Sweet Hereafter" (1997). In this case, the most interesting for me were the references to Lewis Carroll's "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland." This is made all the more intriguing wrapped as the narrative is in noir--and in a less philosophically pretentious manner and of one of sex instead of the stylized violence of "The Matrix" (1999). We get one of the most sexualized and drug-infused variations on the children's character of Alice since the 1970s, including her turn in the porno chic of "Alice in Wonderland: An X-Rated Musical Fantasy" (1976)--enough so, apparently, to earn the title an NC-17 rating from the MPAA. Appropriately, since Alice is an important reference point here, the central detective role (a journalist in this case) is occupied by a woman, who may've been relegated to the role of femme fatale from another perspective. Early on, we see her as a girl dressed in the iconic blue Alice dress from Disney's 1951 animated film and so much other media. Years later, we find out why from a play-within-a-play of "Alice in Wonderland," where "White Rabbit" is also prominently sung, at a children's hospital. Our now grown-up protagonist Alice from the outer narrative (actually named "Karen" and played by Alison Lohman) winds up ingesting such pills as sung about and copulating with the inner-play's Alice, undressing her from the blue dress. As much as a lesbian turn for Alice, this is an autoerotic twist on what Alice found there, to conflate the two Alice books, on stepping through the looking glass.
Indeed, there's a lot of doubling here. Even the title, "Where the Truth Lies," contains a double meaning, if not a third, double entendre interpretation, to go along with the picture's repeated ménage à trois. Besides two Alices and the play-within-the-play, there are also two female aspiring journalists who interview the same subjects, for whom they both have sexual encounters, as well. Two of the characters do so bisexually. The main detective investigates the death of the former--not unlike, say, a Humphrey Bogart searching for the murderer of his partner in "The Maltese Falcon" (1941), plus the explicitly seedy sex of a later neo-noir. The two suspects are a comedic and variety-act duo, a blatant allusion to and fictionalization of the real-life Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis--even including a TV marathon to raise funds for polio instead of muscular dystrophy. The addition of TV, a mise en abyme within the movie, of performers playing performers, offers doubled images, as well, within an art form, cinematography, that is already a reproduction of reality to be mass reproduced itself for commercial distribution.
Along with this picture-within-picture and play-within-play, actors-playing-actors (and there are the reporters' audio recordings within the movie's soundscape, to boot), "Where the Truth Lies" is based on a book, and within the narrative, two other books are being written, by or ghost written for the duo of Lanny and Vince (Kevin Bacon and Colin Firth, respectively)--writers written by writers. At various points, each--Lanny, Vince and Karen--take turns as narrator, including via the usual noir-style voiceover narration. Through these books, too, is where our detective and second ménage-à-trois participant steps in, writing for Vince while receiving chapter manuscripts for Lanny's memoir--all the while unraveling the truth of her predecessor's death--and with drug-induced "Alice in Wonderland" detours doubling along the way.
Indeed, there's a lot of doubling here. Even the title, "Where the Truth Lies," contains a double meaning, if not a third, double entendre interpretation, to go along with the picture's repeated ménage à trois. Besides two Alices and the play-within-the-play, there are also two female aspiring journalists who interview the same subjects, for whom they both have sexual encounters, as well. Two of the characters do so bisexually. The main detective investigates the death of the former--not unlike, say, a Humphrey Bogart searching for the murderer of his partner in "The Maltese Falcon" (1941), plus the explicitly seedy sex of a later neo-noir. The two suspects are a comedic and variety-act duo, a blatant allusion to and fictionalization of the real-life Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis--even including a TV marathon to raise funds for polio instead of muscular dystrophy. The addition of TV, a mise en abyme within the movie, of performers playing performers, offers doubled images, as well, within an art form, cinematography, that is already a reproduction of reality to be mass reproduced itself for commercial distribution.
Along with this picture-within-picture and play-within-play, actors-playing-actors (and there are the reporters' audio recordings within the movie's soundscape, to boot), "Where the Truth Lies" is based on a book, and within the narrative, two other books are being written, by or ghost written for the duo of Lanny and Vince (Kevin Bacon and Colin Firth, respectively)--writers written by writers. At various points, each--Lanny, Vince and Karen--take turns as narrator, including via the usual noir-style voiceover narration. Through these books, too, is where our detective and second ménage-à-trois participant steps in, writing for Vince while receiving chapter manuscripts for Lanny's memoir--all the while unraveling the truth of her predecessor's death--and with drug-induced "Alice in Wonderland" detours doubling along the way.