Rating of
1.5/4
"The Life Of David Gale" by Yojimbo
Yojimbo - wrote on 05/25/12
An anti-death penalty activist convicted of the rape and murder of a colleague offers a final interview with a female reporter in the hope she will uncover the truth about what happened. Alan Parker directing Kevin Spacey and Kate Winslet sounds like a dream ticket, but this overly contrived slice of soulless, mechanical pap completely fails to live up to expectation. The reek of mainstream Hollywood permeates the whole thing, from Spacey's unsympathetically pretentious character through to the inappropriately glib soundtrack that sounds like it would be more at home in a US sitcom. Winslet's character is a walking cliche and the film is punctuated by irritating directorial gimmicks that just grate on the nerves. The plot does have a twist in the tale, but by the time it arrived I'd lost interest. Parker has made some great films in his time. This however, is not one of them.
