The King of Comedy
1982 · Directed by Martin Scorsese
Original language: English
- drama
- comedy
The story
Aspiring comic Rupert Pupkin attempts to achieve success in show business by stalking his idol, a late night talk-show host who craves his own privacy.
What it’s like
Cold, flat daylight and fluorescent office glare give The King of Comedy a drab, unglamorous surface, with Scorsese favouring static, carefully composed frames of studio corridors, a bland suburban living room and a cramped Manhattan apartment wall plastered with cardboard cutouts of a television idol. Interiors run in muted greys, browns and sickly TV-set pastels, while the night-time city feels hollow and wide, and the soundtrack leans on bright, brassy old-Hollywood standards that sound increasingly out of place. The vibe is uneasy and wry, a cringe-comedy that hovers between comfort and dread, best suited to a late night alone or a sharp, thinking-person's watch. Pacing is deliberate and watchful, with long beats of awkward silence and fantasy sequences that break the surface realism. Its emotional register is sour and satirical, following an ambitious, deluded loner whose need to be noticed curdles into a warped, escalating obsession. Violence is limited and sudden rather than gory, with tension and humiliation carrying most of the weight; there is no sexual content and the menace is psychological. It suits viewers who enjoy black comedy about fame, fandom and social discomfort, and who can stay with characters who are hard to like.
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