THE KING IS ALIVE A film review by David N. Butterworth Copyright 2001 David N. Butterworth
*** (out of ****)
Stranded in Africa's equivalent of the Australian outback, a busload of tourists decides to stage an impromptu performance of Shakespeare's "King Lear."
Now perhaps group therapy through artistic expression wouldn't be the first order of business for you or I under these circumstances, and indeed there are some passengers who question the wisdom of all this, but then again we're not appearing in a movie by Danish director Kristian Levring, and don't have three hand-held cameras constantly thrust in our faces, Dogme 95-style.
"The King is Alive" is the latest offering from the Danish movement pioneered by the likes of "Dancer in the Dark"'s Lars Von Trier, a movement which strips "modern day" filmmaking of what it considers to be trippy conveniences--tripods, lighting, non-source music, and directorial credits, resulting in a pure and "natural" film experience.
If anything, the Dogme 95 style works especially well in "The King is Alive," since the drama is played out amid the rough-lit dunes and abandoned mining shacks of an arid North African landscape, where grainy, gritty camerawork heightens the experiences of our marooned protagonists. And indeed the play's the thing, with Levering and his international cast, among them Jennifer Jason Leigh, Bruce Davison, Janet McTeer, and Romane Bohringer, making the production entirely believable given the available options (how quickly would *you* feel left out if someone else got to play Cordelia?).
Where the film breaks down, however, is in its characterizations. Not one of these people is anyone you would want to spend time with, let alone perform alongside. They're whiney and unpleasant, mean and hostile, and this makes their ultimate fate--and that of the film--meaningless, since we care very little about what happens to them.
The cast gives it their all, and it's fascinating seeing how quickly the sexual power struggles come to a head (and, especially, how quickly Levring manages to avoid pretentiousness), but in the end "The King is Alive" more closely approximates another of Shakepeare's works, at least in name: "Much Ado About Nothing."
-- David N. Butterworth dnb@dca.net
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