Just about any film with Rosamund Pike is exciting. She's most likely going to be the villain in her own sophisticated way. I think what makes her intriguing to watch is the way she happens to gaslight her way instead of working with conventional weapons. So, she's regularly typecast into roles that require psychological warfare. 'I care a lot' is no different.
Released in 2020 and directed by J Blakeson, it tells a story of Rosamund Pike who plays the role of Marla Grayson, a legal guardian who has managed to find a way to scam elderly people of their hard earn money. What she does is research with the help of her friend Dr. Karen Amos, for patients who have some trouble taking care of themselves. Things like Alzheimer's might be a reason to request a court order to forcefully place these people in elderly homes. The snag though was that a lot of these patients records were manipulated to exaggerate certain conditions in order to speed this process up, hence the con.
Marla and her girlfriend, Fran(Eiza González) were successful for a while until they decided to target what they felt was a golden ticket in the person of wealthy retiree, Jennifer Peterson(Dianne Wiest). Unfortunately for her, she'd erroneously thought that Jennifer had no children or any other relatives who would care to look for her. The truth was for sure less pleasant but funny all this same. I forgot to mention this falls in the category of black comedy. Roman Lunyov played by Peter Dinklage turns out to be her human trafficker son who is very much ready to do anything to get to see his mother.
As mentioned earlier, Rosamund's strength is in her psychological warfare. Even with no physical strength or underworld connections, she plays a capable woman who is unafraid of any male threat. This belief helps her overcome and talk back in scenes where I expected her to beg for her life. It's interesting to see a 'bad' character manage to insert some kind of feminist ideals. I didn't know whether to cheer or to think thoughts like 'wrong ideal at the wrong time from the wrong person'.
Another interesting character for me here was Sam Rice who plays Damian Rice. I remember him from the Ozarks and for me he plays quite a similar role, in the sense that he is a man who is easily bought, who seeks his self interest but again, I find him likeable. Yea, I know he's a bad character but he happens to do his dirty deals with this posh air and with a cheerful smile. When you're watching a film where there are no good people, the extra flair is what makes the bad ones interesting and he's got that.
After watching this film, I became more aware about this elderly home scam. Films are a mirror of society and even when they are done in a humorous or satirical manner, you still get some exposure and education out of it. This one made me realize that it's important to have family members visibly present in your elderly and loved ones lives because there are just too many people disguising as people wanting your best interests who are ready to manipulate figures and diagnosis for their benefit. I can't imagine the pain of working so hard only to find yourself one day forcefully taken from a life you build with no explanation whatsoever so I was glad this was just a film.
A little trivia which you can find here claims that this movie has been watched by over 56 million households on Netflix.
I enjoyed how easy this was on the eyes and I'd rate it a 9/10 for being an easy going villain movie with interesting characters and a new type of scam story.
I'm always happy to know what you think, so feel free to share your opinions and thoughts about the characters.
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