Take a detour into obsession with Martin Scorsese’s brilliantly unhinged dark comedy about fame and celebrity infatuation.
Robert De Niro gives a mesmerizing performance as Rupert Pupkin, a failure in life but a celebrity in his own mind, playing host on an imaginary talk show in his mother’s basement. When he meets actual talk show host Jerry Langford (Jerry Lewis), he’s convinced it will provide his big break, but Langford isn’t interested in the would-be comedian.
Undaunted, Pupkin stalks Langford — and when that doesn’t work, he teams up with an equally imbalanced woman (Sandra Bernhard), and kidnaps his idol. The ransom? Pupkin gets one appearance on Langford’s show.
Alternating between a flatly lit TV look for reality and a bizarre vision of Rupert’s fantasy world, Scorsese’s brilliantly unsettling black comedy is a biting satire of stardom and media obsession that has only grown more relevant with time.
