Duck

A beguiling and disappointing debut

By PAUL BABIN | August 22, 2007

2.0 Stars

VIDEO: Watch the trailer for Duck.

In Nicole Bettauer’s beguiling, disappointing feature debut, Arthur (Philip Baker Hall) wanders a desolate LA with his pet duck trying to help people. The year is 2009, Jeb Bush is president, and with pensions and Social Security gone, Arthur has nowhere to turn. Bettauer shows a sharp understanding of our nation’s moral fall over the last 10 years and where that might lead us, but her simplistic portrayal of Arthur as innocent martyr undercuts the worthy theme. A character that represents the last moral voice in a world corrupted by the Bush ethos shouldn’t be reduced to a cliché. Hall does his best, spouting out Bettauer’s laconic one-liners and looking absurdly hopeful, but it’s all he’s given to do. Maybe Bettauer feared that a more complex character would distract the audience from her vision of the world headed by yet another Bush. Hall, who musters up so much emotion within a narrow role, deserves better, though the Aflac duck is all he’s quacked up to be.

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Topics: Reviews , Philip Baker Hall, Jeb Bush, DUCK

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ARTICLES BY PAUL BABIN

DUCK | August 22, 2007
Hall, who musters up so much emotion within a narrow role, deserves better, though the Aflac duck is all he’s quacked up to be.

FOUR WEEKS IN JUNE | June 13, 2007
Who would have thought that happiness was just a leap across the generation gap?

STEEL CITY | June 06, 2007
Brian Jun’s film owes more to the family values of the Reagan era than its anarchic characters and hardscrabble style would indicate.