Movie Review

The Life Of David Gale

It was just three days after Governor Ryan had commuted all death sentences in Illinois, so there hardly seemed a movie more relevant then The Life of David Gale, a seemingly complex story of the death penalty.

To top it off, Kevin Spacey and Laura Linney were going to do a Q&A following the screening; so far, so good.
The opening begins with the surreal scene of Kate Winslet running down a street in Huntsville, Texas. It is an interesting scene, but it also marks the high point in the storyline; it?s all downhill from here. The movie rewinds to Kate Winslet (Bitsey) being granted exclusive interview rights with infamous death row inmate and coincidentally enough death row opponent, Kevin Spacey. Winslet is just plain annoying trying to be a tough go-getter news reporter; she argues fiercely against getting a partner (an inevitable plot requirement) but within ten minutes seems fairly dependent on his help. The relationship between the two reporters is a plot obligation and the film has little time to develop it beyond that.

Winslet meets up with Spacey whom we can?t help to see as a little too comfortable in prison, death row at that. The rest of the movie plays out in three parts, each told in retrospect by Spacey in jail. Like any hardworking journalist, Winslet buys every word of it and after only one conversation, she is rushing around trying to prove Spacey?s innocence. Yet, in the background, a mysterious figure follows their every move. Great for a thriller, but this movie was selling itself as a death row drama. All the paranoia and frantic searching moves this film from a work of significance like Dead Man Walking to the utter fanciful. Fanciful is not bad; that?s the whole point of most movies, but this comes down to just plain ridiculous.

Spacey begins his story back when he was a professor, a very cool professor who enjoyed boozing and sleeping around with his students. This behavior eventually gets him into to some trouble and long story short, his life spirals out of control. How is all this connected? It finally is, but it ends up being a poorly conglomerated mess. Although Kevin Spacey himself defended the movie saying it was something that would get people talking, it really attempts to accomplish too much with not enough skill. It can?t combine thriller, drama, social commentary and romance effectively and ultimately turns out a mediocre mixture of these elements It?s not a commentary on death row, although it tries to throw in the weighty matter and it?s not an effective thriller because the puzzle pieces are ultimately forced together.

Some may be really surprised and in a sense converted by the end of the movie, which I won?t reveal since, for some, it could make the difference between liking the movie or not. Given some serious thought, the ending and the whole movie begins to fall upon. There are philosophy lectures in the movie, but it looks like the screenwriter and director were playing hooky. It?s an interesting hypothetical, but unrealistic and only pseudo-intellectual. If you buy the ending, you?ll no doubt enjoy what you just watched but for everyone else, it will be a tough sell.

Jason's Grade: C

A	0.0%
B	50.0%
C	50.0%
D	0.0%
F	0.0%