K-PAX (2001) from Johnny Web (Uncle Scoopy; Greg Wroblewski)

In the opening scene, Kevin Spacey tries to assist a woman who has been assaulted. The police mistakenly blame him at first, and while they are detaining him they find that he has no name, no I.D., no visible means of support, and he's hanging around a train station without a ticket. Oh, and one other minor detail. He claims to be a visitor from outer space.

The psychiatrist assigned to his case has to deconstruct Spacey's past in such a manner as to reveal who is really is, and why he is pretending to come from the planet K-PAX. That he does, but in the process of studying his patient, he turns up some strange facts. He finds evidence that identifies Spacey as a man who killed another man in New Mexico after finding that man had killed his wife and daughter. But the psychiatrist also finds credible evidence that Spacey is who he says he is, a visitor from outer space.

1. If Spacey is just a nutbag, how did he manage to describe the geometry of his solar system with hand calculations faster than the world's greatest astrophysicists could do it on their computers. (Their calculations proved that he was correct). Could one guy who used to work in a meat-packing slaughterhouse be that much smarter than the smartest men in the world? If Bridges was really a man of science, he would have to concede that there was far more going on than just a simple, troubled delusional from New Mexico.

2. If Spacey is a mere earthling, how does he manage to see light in the non-visible spectrum? Are we to believe that, in addition to having the  greatest mind in all of history, he's also the guy with greatest eyes in all of history?

3. How could the other patient, the one who was to accompany him back to K-PAX, have disappeared at the exact time that the space trip was supposed to take place? If Spacey travels through space after discarding his earthly body, why is her body missing?

4. How could a mere mortal Spacey have known and communicated the dog's grievances in such detail unless he really could speak to the dog?

You see what I'm driving at here? It is a scientist's job to evaluate the facts in front of him, and to change his opinions and "scientific" beliefs if his beliefs can't possibly conform to the facts. Bridges and his associates claim it's silly and unscientific to believe that Spacey is from outer space. Well, how else could a professional cow-stunner be hundreds of times smarter than the world's smartest astrophysicists? It is not unscientific to believe Spacey's story. It is unscientific NOT to.

This tends to spoil the film a bit because we are not as dumb as the scientists and psychiatrists in the film. We can see that there is no plausible explanation other than there must, somehow, be some truth to Spacey's story. No matter how many red herrings they feed us about the poor schmuck in New Mexico and his troubled history, there is no other way to explain his grasp of advanced mathematics that the world's greatest scientists have never thought of, but can confirm as correct! Spacey may be a cow-stunner, but he's not JUST a cow-stunner. It is certainly scientific to doubt the outer space story in the first place, but it isn't scientific to keep denying it by shrugging off accomplishments which no human is capable of. Since we can see this, some of the surprise is spoiled for us. There's no rational way to explain his grasp of math and physics, so we know early in the film that there has to be some truth to his claim.

I would have preferred the story if the scientists could have figured out an explanation, and there turned out to be no alien presence, but that isn't they way it went down, and I think the scriptwriter has to stay consistent with his own premise. He did not always do so.

Having said all that, let me hasten to add that I really liked the film. It isn't really about a space visitor, and the plot details aren't that important. It's about what is important in life, and how we should view the world we live in, and each other. As Bridges examines the delusional patient, he comes to understand that he is making a mess of his own family life, and in a certain way the patient cures him.

The film also very subtly asks without actually asking - "what if Jesus came back now?" - would anyone believe him? Wouldn't they just think he was a loony, and try to analyze him, no matter how much evidence he produced? Now that I think about it, that's pretty much what was supposed to have happened when JC showed up the first time, if you believe the biblical accounts. The parallels are quite clear. Spacey's education of the astrophysicists is a precise parallel to Jesus educating the learned men in the temple. Spacey's healing of the mental patients is comparable to Christ's curing the sick. Spacey even preaches much of the same message. Spacey even points out that very few humans ever "got it" on the whole spiritual development thing. He points out that even though Christ and Buddha saw the path, Christians and Buddhists generally do not.

All that pontificating on the failures of the human race could have been a supercilious sermon or pure sap if played wrong, but Spacey does it so matter-of-factly that the film is allowed to make its points with a scalpel rather than with a sledgehammer.

Although the film grossed $50 million, is rated 7.2 at IMDb, and got solid reviews from the top critics that we cite, it is remembered as something of a failure. For the studio, that's partially correct. The moguls invested $48 million in it, and it will be a while before they recoup their investment, because theater owners get half of the gross. The studio needed this to be a $100 million dollar picture, and it wasn't.