Latest Updates - Kevin Spacey

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Comment by Magic Marmalade:

In the nut-house again.

(It gives me pause to reflect on how many movies I like deal with mental illness: The Fisher King, Benny And Joon, One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest, As Good As It Gets....etc. Purely coincidental, I'm sure! (twitch twitch :)


When I watched it first time round, all those years ago, I remember feeling it was a bit of a vanity project... indulgence, and vehicle / excuse to shoehorn Kevin Spacey onto our screens, off the back of a plethora of memorable performances elsewhere, and I remember it feeling a very...slight movie - a little too economical, sparse, and cold feeling. I think the production design has a lot to do with, as it looks a little less than cinematic, and more like TV... like an episode of NCIS or something, with that kind of aesthetic.

Watching again now, a lot of that hasn't changed for me, but I do find I've warmed to the story a characters a little more, and the cool look and feel is appreciated in how it conveys a sense of the ethereal, and otherworldly, consistent with the theme of a man (Spacey) who apparently arrives from out of thin air, declares himself to be from another planet, and is immediately taken to a psychiatric ward of the hospital, to be investigated and assessed by Jeff Bridges' psychiatrist.

Prot(e) (Spacey) begins to rub off on, and have an effect on, not only the other patients, but the doctors, and Bridges himself, due to the enduring enigma the movie works off of:

Is he actually nuts, or is he really from another planet?!?

>Your Kevin Spacey joke here<

(...er, or perhaps... best not!)

It is, despite it's economy, and fragile surface beauty, actually quite a touching, tragic, yet warm and engaging movie nevertheless, and still worth watching.