Posted: 11/19/2001

K-PAX

(2001)

by Hank Yuloff

K-PAX tells the story of Prot (Kevin Spacey), a mysterious patient at a mental hospital who claims to be from a distant planet called K-PAX.

We are not alone in the Universe. Art Bell aficionados aside, the Earth, a planet whose outcome is “unknown,” is being visited by beings who share a human being’s body and mind while they explore our civilization as a living anthropological expedition.

Or…Kevin Spacey just did a wonderful job portraying a man who has so completely retreated into his fantasy world that a psychiatrist isn’t able to help him.

These are the two plausible explanations we are left with after viewing K-PAX. I prefer to accept the first.

Spacey plays Prot, a man who claims he is from a planet in a galaxy far, far away. At the beginning of the movie he becomes involved with helping a woman who is mugged only to be taken away by the cops as a mental patient. He comes to the attention of Dr. Mark Powell (Jeff Bridges—The Contender, The Big Lebowski, Starman), the head of a Manhattan psychiatric hospital. Powell feels he can cure Prot, he just has to find the missing pieces to the puzzle. One of them is the date of July 27, when Prot says he is hopping on a beam of light back to K-PAX. He struggles with how to react to his patient because Prot is the most convincing delusional has ever come across.

While we go along for the several month journey that Prot and Dr. Powell take together, we are given dozens of clues to help us decide which of the above scenarios is the correct one: Prot the space traveler, or Prot the mental patient. Either way, both Spacey and Bridges are excellent in their roles. I found myself feeling deeply for Prot to be from another planet because of the positive message of hope it could be bringing. It is rather like a pre-Warp Flight Federation that is checking in on Earth—hoping that we get our act together so we may be a part of a good and just Universe. Especially convincing is an evening when Prot is taken to a university planetarium for a discussion of his home planet with some astrophysicists. With Bridges in this movie, it is hard not to make some mention of his 1984 movie Starman, in which he is an unintentional visitor from another planet, landing when he has problems with his space ship. The difference between the two movies’ protagonists is that with K-PAX we are never really sure if Prot did come another solar system.

Speaking of 1984, K-PAX also has the best use of a banana (and other produce) in a film since Eddie Murphy stuck a banana in Art Kimbro’s tailpipe in Beverly Hills Cop.

The supporting cast is also quite believable. The patients in the hospital are not made to seem too crazy to be real, but they definitely have problems being part of regular society. Especially good was Kimberly Scott who plays Bridges’ secretary. The main purpose of her character in the movie is to add some light comedic moments, which she does without overacting—she could be in any of our offices as the perfect assistant.

K-PAX looks to be a career maker for director Iain Softley. He has previously directed a few other movies, but K-PAX is by far the best. Likewise for writers Gene Brewer and Charles Leavitt. They do not have many credits between them, but K-PAX is certainly a great door opener to take more meetings. I know it is getting a door opener to my top movie list for the year.

Hank Yuloff is looking for new life in old plot complications and is looking to go where not a lot of guys in Los Angeles have gone before.

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