Monday 26 November 2007

The King of Comedy (1983) - ickleReview (TV)

Martin Scorsese film about a delusional and talentless stand-up comedian, Rupert Pupkin (Robert De Niro), who pesters talk-show host Jerry Langford (Jerry Lewis) into giving him a spot on his show. Pupkin's obsessive behaviour is unrewarded until he and fellow celebrity-nut, Masha (the hilarious Sandra Bernhard), kidnap Langford.

Scorsese takes advantage of the viewer's willingness to believe in the reality of the film to portray
Pupkin's delusional fantasies, but it is not always immediately obvious what is imagined and what "really" happened.

Nugget: an intriguing study of obsessive behaviour, which is both darkly comic and disturbingly close to the bone. I suspect most of us have the potential for such obsessive behaviour, but not all of us act upon it so readily.

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