THE BIG KAHUNA (2000) **1/2 Kevin Spacey, Danny De Vito, Peter Facinelli. (Dir: John Swanback)
Kevin Spacey, arguably one of our finest actors performing today and with a recent Oscar win as Best Actor in the Best Picture of the Year, `American Beauty', has talent to burn and in his current display of subtle, nuanced brio he takes a step down in this indie satire that he produced, as a pet project.
Spacey stars as Larry Mann, a fast-talking, smug and perhaps too sharp for his own good marketing salesman for a midWestern industrial lubricant manufacturer who is one of three fellow travelers setting up a much anticipated greet/meet with an important client (the eponymous moniker he uses as a mantra to signify the underlining of its significance) in the unlikely hotel suite in Wichita, Kansas.
Also on board are his best friend and longtime associate Phil Cooper (De Vito in a wonderfully low-keyed, yet bluntly hewned turn) and green recruit Bob Walker (Facinelli, who I am hard pressed to keep from comparing him to a Tom Cruise manque, and proved wrong I might add by his performance that requires full concentration and total believeablilty for his task at hand), who contradict the self-assured Larry, who has convened the trio on their cramped luxury accomodations, by being there for one sole purpose: land the grand account.
What makes the story intriguing is the cutting dialogue lobbed with perfection by its players that manage to raise it above a watered down David Mamet parable about men bonding (and unbonding as the case remains) and the cunning skill it takes to be a businessman and shirking one's individuality for the almighty buck. That's when the film on itself nearly capsizes.
Basically the storyline unfolds like `Waiting For Godot', the three salesman have set up a cocktail party for their meeting with this red herring of sorts, and what ultimately comes down the pike is he shows but unknowingly to Larry and Phil, has had a heart to heart with the young Bob. Realizing they only have one shot when Bob casually describes a warm conversation leading to an invitation to an exclusive gathering late in the evening, Larry and Phil persuade their cohort to ingratiate himself into the good graces of their client-to-be which results in an unlikely turn of events: namely the subject of one's self-beliefs (i.e. what one considers important and in this case it is Bob's straight-arrow image and his strong will in being a faithful, God-fearing man who loves his wife and believes there's more to life than this account).
Spacey and De Vito, reunited from `L.A. Confidential' make a nice comic team as they try to make sense of their lives, particularly the latter's downward spiral since his pending divorce and sudden sense of getting out of the business, leaving the former flummoxed and later, to a fault, self-discovery that it may have been too late.
There are some comparisons to a Billy Wilder sense of responsiblities here and the stagy direction by theatrical trained Swanback (the piece was performed onstage as well) but that only enhances the nicely conveyed characters on screen. Spacey has a lot of fun here particularly in having his character display some spontaneous feats of frustration to comic effect: in one scene he practically has a hissy fit on a sofa and in another his apoplectic facial reactions are only harnessed by his sarcastic responses. Funny and enlightening: a rare combination. The same could be said of Kevin Spacey himself.
