Review of The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters (2007) by Caleb R — 12 May 2009

Documentaries about real people can be tricky, because it's really easy for them to turn into an opportunity for cheap voyeurism by art snobs like me: "Oh wow, look at this freak from Freaktown, USA.

He's a freak! I'm glad I'm not a freak. Pass the organic popcorn ..." The King of Kong could have very easily fallen into this trap, because it is about people who are maybe just a TAD too interested in Donkey Kong, but somehow, this movie really works because it was hard for me to draw any distance between me and the main characters.

Sure, I'm not obsessed with Donkey Kong, but I have been obsessed, and I recognize the patterns people fall into as they pursue a goal they desperately desire. The King of Kong is hilariously funny, because .

.. yeah ... some of these guys are a little freakish ... but on a deeper level, it works because it's yet another window into what people do when faced with a goal that is almost existential in its intensity, even if everyone around them doesn't entirely understand why.

(See Fitzcarraldo, Grizzly Man ... hell, see any of Herzog's films).