Thursday, September 27, 2007
King of California
I believe that it's juvenile and tasteless when one makes fun of mentally ill people, if it's not crude and mean spirit. Unfortunately, the new comedy "King of California" (USA 2007, 96 min.) did just like that, and it's not funny.
Dressed like a homeless person from San Francisco streets, Michael Douglas is released from a mental hospital and lives with his 17 years old daughter. He is obsessed to find hidden Spanish treasure that is supposed to buried somewhere not too far from where they live -- a local Costco. They begin their journey to uncover the treasure, even though everybody knows he is mentally unstable. One might get a chuckle or two out of the film, however, simply because of the casting. We all have these sharp images of Michael Douglas in "Wall Street" or "A Perfect Murder." We always see him in an expensive suits talking eloquently. Now, he is in long beard and mumbling non-sense, which is totally beyond the expectation. But sadly, the joke is on Mr. Douglas's character, a mentally ill patient. He can't think straight. But why is he released from the hospital? Perhaps the people around him are really the ones can't think straight, because they tag along with his actions one step after another one. And by the end of the film by the end, we really can't tell if he is indeed crazy. The plot is simply an absurd mess. Yet, it seems all these incompetent cheap shots labeled as humor are not bad enough, at the last scene, the film throws a bunch Chinese people to California shores. It's not comic, it is plain offensive and ignorant. I thought I hate so much about "I Know Who Killed Me." Well, I hate this movie even more. Certainly it gets the title as the king of the worst films of the year. |
