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Based on a novel by Gene Brewer,
K-PAX works best as an adult drama of self-discovery, blessed by the talents of costars Jeff Bridges and Kevin Spacey. Bridges plays Manhattan psychiatrist Mark Powell, who thinks he's seen it all until he's assigned to analyze Prot (Spacey), a psychiatric patient who claims to be from a distant planet called K-PAX. Powell is convinced that Prot is "a convincing delusional," but his cynicism turns to open-minded fascination as Prot's case reveals a combination of otherworldly insight and all-too-human trauma, prompting an earthbound explanation for Prot's allegedly alien origins. As directed by Ian Softley (
Wings of the Dove), this curiously engrossing drama allows Spacey to create a provocative and humorously eccentric enigma, while Bridges superbly conveys his character's compassionate empathy. Their finely shaded performances raise
K-PAX above the forced ambiguity of its ending, which is both thought-provoking and vaguely anticlimactic.
--Jeff Shannon
From The New Yorker
As a creature named Prot who may have dropped in from another planet, Kevin Spacey has a good moment with a dog, kneeling down with the frisky beast and interpreting its barks as speech. But that's about it. What should have been spooky fun is mainly soft-brained and painstakingly earnest. Jeff Bridges, looking about thirty pounds heavier than usual, plays a workaholic psychiatrist who cannot figure out whether Prot is truly an alien or just a head case. Meanwhile, Prot liberates all the bedraggled psychotics who live in the mental ward with him. The director, Iain Softley, uses the lunatics as a kind of comic chorus-an offensive idea masquerading as daring humanism. -David Denby
Copyright © 2006
The New Yorker
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