‘X-Files’ at 20: A fan’s notes

Sunday night, the L.A. Times’ 2013 Hero Complex Film Festival closed with a celebratory tribute to “The X-Files,” in its 20th-anniversary year. Episodes were shown and “Hero Complex” editor Gina McIntyre interviewed creator Chris Carter, along with Darin Morgan, who wrote for and acted in the show, and his writer-producer brother Glen Morgan.

In celebration of this celebration, I wrote an essay, posted Sunday in Hero Complex, on the influential paranormal procedural, its look, its people, and my own preference, as a viewer, for fuzziness over certainty. Excerpts:

On the series’ aesthetic: “Even more than ‘Twin Peaks,’ ‘The X-Files’ explored mood as content. Though it was born in the age of the 4:3 aspect ratio and (comparatively) low-resolution image, there was from the beginning an intentional, emotional, painterly use of color and shape and a choreographic approach to light. You can watch the show with the sound down and still feel what you are meant to feel.”

RELATED: ‘X-Files’ stars: Where are they now?

On the pairing of David Duchovny (as Fox Mulder) and Gillian Anderson (as Dana Scully): “Both Duchovny and Anderson had a softness, even a sleepiness, superficially at odds with their roles as FBI agents and action heroes. They were not dry and deadpan, exactly (though they were, through the years, increasingly droll). Theirs was a kind of restrained sensuality, a narcotic eroticism. Scully and Mulder, Mulder and Scully — pivoting on that central ul, you can begin with one name and end with the other: Mully. Sculder. They are two sides of the same coin, interlocking yin and yang, one unthinkable without the other.”

You can read the whole thing here.

Meanwhile, enjoy this fan-made video romp through some signature Scully and Mulder moments.

robert.lloyd@latimes.com