Tallulah Hazekamp Schwab’s Mr. K is Franz Kafka meets Samuel Beckett with a dash of Barton Fink meets Dark City. What could it be like to be consumed by one’s own self, manifested as a hotel that is seemingly consuming all of its imprisoned occupants?
That’s exactly the nightmare Crispin Glover’s title character Mr. K walks into. A beleaguered traveling illusionist, disillusioned with his life and profession, checks into a hotel for a night and ends up in his own private hell. For as he rises after a confusing and alarming check in, which includes a laundry list of things forbidden by guests paired with a couple of staff members secretly hiding in his room upon entry, Mr. K heads for the lobby only to find himself walking in circles, then being chased back to his room by a marching band that spontaneously emerges from passages in the walls.
Next thing you know, his bags are being stolen by a pair of random children. Mr. K gives chase only to find that the hotel is a little like Alice’s Wonderland. Doors that should lead to closets open on elaborate parties and feasting. Mr. K is welcomed and is invited to join the celebrations. The whole time, his wanting to leave or be led to the lobby falls upon deaf ears.
Soon, he is led away from the feasting and into a myriad of weird and populated spaces. A pair of old ladies who have everything they need, strange, solitary mutes that pass between corridors at a distance, the lady from the lobby who slips away the second Mr. K tries to get to her.
“Doors that should lead to closets open on elaborate parties and feasting.”
At length, our suffering protagonist arrives in a massive kitchen in which eggs are prepared meticulously in every manner one can prepare an egg for consumption. Mr. K is put to work and soon forms an awkward friendship with a fellow worker who shows him the ropes of this repetitious yet rewarding existence in the kitchen.
Still, all Mr. K has on his mind is getting the hell out of there. Sadly, his requests are met with a bizarre mix of forceful rejection and aloof forgetfulness, as most trapped in this place are unaware that they are trapped. Schwab then finally throws it together, blitzing all these elements in the weird s**t blender as Mr. K’s search for the answer to the exit leads him into a whole new realm of surreal.
Writer/director Schwab has crafted a piece that is beautiful, austere, and terrifying. Anchored by a restrained bordering on unhinged performance by Glover at the center of an almost Cronenbergian riff on a Jeunet and Caro movie, elegantly composed by cinematographer Frank Griebe.
As close as one thinks they might get to the hidden meaning, a turn intercedes, which sends you spiraling into a ballet of confusion. But isn’t the real beauty in the secrets of the universe made so, primarily because they remain a mystery? In some strange way, that’s how I feel about Mr. K.
"…beautiful, austere and terrifying."
