One day Elvis Presley decided to retire and, having found a double, made a contract with him under which he could return at any time. But by a silly accident his copy of that contract burned down and he had no choice but to start living the life of his former imitator. In an accident he ended up in an asylum in Texas, where he was in a coma for 20 years.
Waking up already decrepit old man, he realizes that the years are irretrievably gone, decides to retire peacefully. But even here, he is only dreaming of peace! Acquaintance with the ostensibly still alive President John Kennedy, who everywhere he sees new plots to assassinate him again, a series of mysterious deaths that have broken the measured course of life in the orphanage “Deserved Rest” – all this revives the tired and forgotten Elvis Aaron Presley to life and struggle again!
4k movies reviews
After watching it, wondering why this tiny, absurd movie so captures the eye and makes the brain work, I quickly found the answer – it’s deeper than it looks at first glance. On a boldly evocative canvas of delirious subject matter, the filmmaker has managed to convey the contemplative aspect of human life coming to the point of “picking up the rocks.” This film is a true trance, where we are able to peer into the old age, the regretful thoughts of people from the asylum, dive into their unfulfilled dreams, know the downside of former hopes and accomplishments, find ourselves in their unenviable skin, when you are only a worthless outdated interior detail with faded eyes (scene, where the daughter who arrives for one single visit only to collect her dead father’s belongings easily and simply throws his Purple Heart Order and photograph in the trash, turning her heel to her elderly neighbor unashamedly – expresses the main point as accurately as possible). And these enumerated moments in the film are conveyed at the expense of two famous characters: Elvis Aaron Presley and John F. Kennedy. At the same time, I firmly believe that these names are not mere kitsch, but a springboard for the audience to easily perceive many of the nuances of their past, that is, so that we do not have to watch the prologue revelations, showing who they were and what they accomplished.
The King of Rock ‘n’ Roll, however colorful his buddy, comes to the forefront of the central character. Elvis’ philosophical truthful voice-over thoughts very accurately define decrepit old age, frightening loneliness, futility and the doom of changing anything. Every utterance is believable, even if it is crude at times, but real and unvarnished. Everything comes full circle, and it is especially frightening when there is no one in front of you but yourself in an empty room, where the world around you does not identify you as a human being.
But this movie would not be a modern masterpiece (in my opinion only) if director-screenwriter Don Coscarelli (not a man without names) and wonderful actor Bruce Campbell (also a famous actor) had not deftly and harmoniously incorporated here humor, however slightly pessimistic, and sometimes in contrast and cheerful to spite everything, however it is in reality between us all in its duality, where it is funny to cry at. Some phrases are curious, for example, when Elvis, describing the mutant beetle, gives a comparison of its size with a can of peanut butter and a banana sandwich, and in fact is already a household name, as the singer liked to eat this snack. And then there’s the dramatic one, where he’s already a tired old man turning on the TV and finding an audience to the delight of a twenty-four-hour marathon of movies starring himself, where he’s young and popular, surrounded by hotties, and he fights the “bad guys.”
John F. Kennedy came out no less beguiling. If twenty years ago, tired of camera flashes, the glitter of the footlights, drugs, failures in his personal life, and the exhausting close circle of “leeches,” Elvis makes an adventure and secretly changes places with a copycat double to live a quieter life, portraying himself at his pleasure in small towns, after one unlucky fall off stage and into a coma, Kennedy in a nursing home is no coincidence. He insists that when he was shot he didn’t die at all, just had some sand inserted in place of the shot part of his brain and is alive and well. And the fact that he’s black (a natural Negro) is the villains who put him in here, took him in and painted him upside down! All in all, their tandem is wonderful; one a sad, frustrated old man with notes of sarcasm, the other also an old man, but with a constant manic apprehension of another assassination attempt being prepared.
And what additional directorial genius is in the succinct way of fitting a logical explanation here and there into the ridiculous story of the inconceivable course of events with two famous people (to the public dead, by the way), to top it all off with a very real horror movie with a mummy in it too! And give a pretty good explanation for its presence in America, in a nursing home.
Initially, the picture is set by the story of Joe R. Lansdale – writer with many awards for his craft, apparently, God did not spare him the gift to combine the seemingly incompatible, giving unexpected clarity to a motley canvas of history. The character of the mummy does not look inappropriate, he is just needed now, he is also an old man, if you look at it; he is a lot of years old, decrepit, retarded, he will not defeat the swift, but young. And where is the best place for such a monster, the answer is self-evident. Therefore, when there is a fight between the monster and our tandem of pensioners, the show is quite dignified in its slowness due to the ages of opponents.
Also adding to the “scary” atmosphere are the excellent sets of the gloomy asylum, its dark brown walls, the remote terrain from the bustling crowds of passers-by and the camera angles that artistically cut the above.
Perhaps some people won’t like this movie, which is understandable, because there is no spectacle as such, the final battle is full of reckless drama, where two old men with crutches and in a wheelchair, dressed up in their costumes, barely make it through the night against a flabby staggering mummy, where the humor is occasionally harsh (the monster was eating souls, he was sucking them from the bodies of pensioners, and from… In general, the steady American expression “save your ass” applies here quite directly between Elvis and John), but personally I was just really happy, a meditative story imbued with the main point to us viewers, because when the movie ends, you firmly understand that no matter how old you are – you can still feel life, much less do things. Through pessimism to soothing optimism and peace of mind, here, perhaps, is the whole framework of the film’s energy, nicely brightened up throughout the entire running time by the languid, relaxing purr of music, precisely taken from the TV series “Twin Peaks”.
Of course, it’s up to you whether to watch it or not, but I think an opinion has already been formed in order to know in advance what this creation is about for the benefit of an informed encounter with a philosophical and unhurried horror film and a dramatic comedy in one person.
Info Blu-ray
Video
Codec: HEVC / H.265 (83.9 Mb/s)
Resolution: Native 4K (2160p)
HDR: Dolby Vision, HDR10
Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.85:1
Audio
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (48kHz, 24-bit)
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 (48kHz, 24-bit)
English: Dolby Digital 5.1
English: Dolby Digital 2.0
Subtitles
English SDH, English.
