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Much of this story is fictionalized and over-stated. Alan Conway was a real person who did impersonate Stanley Kubrick during the 1990s. However, the real Conway ran a travel agency and had a son, who lived with him for a while.
Conway definitely left his wife and pursued gay relationships, but the way this film portrayed him was as a continually lying and compulsive character, who lived off the gullibility of others. The real Conway seemed to have paid at least some of his own way.
Conway did attend a rehab clinic run by the Priory group, but he attended one of 200 centres in Britain, not a boutique clinic for up and outers, as portrayed in the film. According to an article on him by The Guardian, the treatment was successful and he joined AA afterwards.
The film contains much that Kubrick lovers can enjoy - the music, a signature of all of Kubrick's films, appears during ironic and amusing episodes. Around the corner of Conway's house is a sex shop called "The Blue Danube" - a reference to the music played during the spaceship / space station dance in 2001; When Conway is assaulted by friends who discover his true identity, the tunes from "Clockwork Orange" play; The music at the clinic evokes memories of the Overlook Hotel, as does the interior design of the clinic.
John Malkovich is the star of the film. His Conway/Kubrick changes accents and mannerisms all the time according to who he is with. He is American in one scene, Cockney in another, even South African at one stage (the real Conway lived in South Africa for a while).
There's also a "Malkovich" moment in the film when Conway (played by John Malkovich and impersonating Stanley Kubrick) tells friends at his dinner table that he is casting "John Malkovich" for a role in his new film. "Who's he?" asks one of his guests.
But for me the film fell flat. It ended too abruptly for my taste. I wanted to see how Conway lived the rest of his life. I wanted to see a scene in which the "real" Stanley Kubrick is informed of the imposter (Peter Jackson would have been great playing Stanley Kubrick). I wanted to see him on television (the real Conway did appear on TV).
I also wanted to see bit actors from Kubrick films make an appearance. Warren Clark, Dalziel from "Dalziel & Pascoe", played Dim in "Clockwork Orange". Couldn't the producers have invited him in for a scene? What about letting Lia Beldam appear briefly nude as she did in "The Shining"? The film yearned for in-jokes like these to be played for Kubrick fans, but they avoided them.
One last thing - for some reason I had believed that Conway actually made it onto the set of "Eyes Wide Shut" and had confused some of those involved in it. This was definitely not the case either in real life or in the film.
And spare a thought for Joe Longthorne, the real British singer who fell for Conway's tricks and who was given another name in the film. Poor bloke. Must be terribly embarrassed.
score 5/10
one_salient_oversight 14 February 2007
Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw1599062/ |
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1-4-2021 06:05:11