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K-Pax
Director: Iain Softley (2001)
Distributor: Film Four
Distributors. Certificate: 12
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One of the recurring themes of human experience is that of the unexpected stranger who appears in our midst, effecting change for good. Often it is in the guise of the unlikeliest of people. Iain Softley’s film K-PAX highlights this theme once again.
Mysteriously appearing at New York’s Grand Central Station, Prot (Kevin Spacey) is mistakenly questioned by police about a bag-snatch. Insisting that he is a visitor to earth who has arrived on a beam of light from the planet K-PAX, Prot is consigned to the Manhattan Institute of Psychiatry and referred to Dr Mark Powell (Jeff Bridges). Prot quickly becomes the centre of attention for both the medical staff and his fellow patients as his story becomes more compelling. Dr Powell is unconvinced but intrigued, especially as Prot is able to see ultraviolet light unaided ~ not a possibility for human beings. He also has a bewildering knowledge of astronomy that confounds the country’s foremost experts. As the story unfolds it becomes clear that Prot is intending to return to K-PAX at 5.51 a.m. on July 27 and offers to take one of his fellow patients back with him. Unlike the medical staff, they are convinced of his alien identity.
When spending a day with the doctor and his family, Prot has a psychotic episode confirming Dr Powell’s suspicion that Prot’s K-PAX story is a defence against a traumatic past event that is linked in some way to the impending date. Concerned that Prot will suffer unless the puzzle is solved, Dr Powell tries hypnosis and the truth begins to emerge. Prot speaks of an unnamed friend who used to call on him in times of crisis and to whom he would travel from K-PAX to help. Piecing together the clues, Dr Powell travels to a town in New Mexico where he discovers from the local sheriff the details of an horrific event that took place almost five years earlier. A local abattoir worker named Robert Porter returned home from work to catch a stranger who had just murdered his wife and daughter. Porter killed the man and then vanished from the town, the police finding his clothes at the riverside and believing him to be drowned.
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Dr Powell confronts Prot with the story, but Prot remains unmoved and convinced of his approaching return to K-PAX. The appointed time eventually arrives and the closed-circuit television camera in Prot’s secure room goes on the blink. Dr Powell rushes to the room to discover the catatonic figure of Robert Porter on the floor, the personality that was Prot having vanished. A fellow patient named Bess also disappears at the same time, and despite checks with local hospitals at bus and rail stations no trace of her is found. |
K-PAX is a cleverly-crafted film that leaves you thinking for most of the time that of course Prot is a deluded person, his ‘alien’ identity a means of protecting himself from the awful experience of his past. But there is just enough that does not add up, leaving some unresolved questions. How did he know information that was ground-breaking to the greatest astronomers of his day? How could he see ultraviolet light? Why did he affect those around him so profoundly? Even Dr Powell is helped by Prot to a greater awareness of his own family and reconciliation with a wayward son. And what happened to Bess? The chemistry between Jeff Bridges and Kevin Spacey works well and it is interesting to see Bridges, who once placed an alien himself in Star Man this time play opposite Spacey’s ‘alien’.
If you enjoy a film that leaves you thinking by the time you get home that the ending was not quite as straightforward as it first seemed, this is one for you.
THROUGH THE LENS OF CHRISTIAN FAITH
Within the Christian story, the notion of the unexpected visitor who arrives in a situation and brings about transformation is often expressed in the language of angels. The word means ‘messenger’ and however angels are understood there are literally hundreds of references to them in the Bible. They appear time and time again as God’s servants, carrying out tasks such as announcing God’s purposes for his people and watching over them. It was, of course, an angel that announced the greatest ever message that humankind has received: that God was to become one of us in Jesus (Luke 1.26-38).
There are also places where human beings are described as angels (i.e. God’s messengers). One such reference can be found in the Letter to the Hebrews where the writer says: ‘Keep on loving each other as brothers and sisters. Do not forget to entertain strangers, for by so doing some people have entertained angels without knowing it’ (Hebrews 13.1-2).
Now while I am not suggesting that in K-PAX Prot is an angel, there is something of a parallel. Whether he is an alien or a troubled man with deep-seated psychological problems, Prot is the stranger who mysteriously arrives on the scene. He touches the lives of those around him for a while and then, just as mysteriously, he is gone.
Sometimes our own lives are enriched by an unexpected encounter with someone who we could not have anticipated meeting. It might only be a fleeting encounter, yet it is life-changing. Some type of connection happens and the direction of our life is changed. Reflect for a moment on your own life. Call to mind any such people in your own experience and give thanks to God for the way they have been angels to you. And keep your eyes open for the next time!
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