Let's Wind the Clocks Back - "Being There"

10/10

I pimp this movie at every opportunity. It amazes me how obscure it has become. I would never have heard of it except a professor of mine showed it in class one week. I was mesmerized. You can put this movie in the same category as Benjamin Button and Forrest Gump. I don't exactly know what that category is, but if you watch this movie, you'll understand.

Peter Sellers owns this movie, without a doubt. His performance captures your attention from the jump and keeps that stranglehold throughout. Sellers plays an enigmatic savant who unwittingly says all the right things at all the right times. Now you may be thinking, "This sounds like a snoozer. Another sappy simpleton movie." You will probably be surprised to know that "Being There" is a comedy and quite a hilarious one. Sellers plays it deadpan, but the events of the movie are so absurd that one cannot help but laugh.

The supporting cast is excellent as well. Most of the supporting characters are hyper-successful. Even the President of the United States makes an appearance. Then there is the man with whom Chance stays for most of the movie; he is a rich business man who is battling a severe illness. So you have all these rich and powerful people who seem to have everything and then you have the simpleton Chance, who has nothing. But you are left wondering who has things more figured out. The richies clearly think Chance knows more than they do. Chance, well who knows what he thinks.

With a host of likable characters and a final scene that will throw off your entire perception of the movie, it's little wonder that "I like to watch."