Carter Page III is quite the ladies man. Suave, well-coiffed and foppishly decked, this swanky socialite is paid handsomely to entertain some of Washington's most powerful wives, using his silky southern tongue to give them a kind of pleasure their husbands could only dream of satisfying. That's because Carter - an open homosexual - is a regular bastion of tasty gossip.
If this is the first time you've heard of Paul Schrader's new film The Walker,"" you're not alone - but since a mass advertising campaign would have inevitably misrepresented this film as a juicy Washington murder mystery brimming with political scandal, deception and high-class affairs - it's probably better that you haven't.
Written and directed by Schrader - famous for his ""Raging Bull"" and ""Taxi Driver"" screenplays - the film is Hitchcockianly disguised as a second-rate thriller, but main concern is not its genre convention, but its compelling protagonist, masterful directing and dialogue that snaps like Hungry Hungry Hippos manned by caffeinated six year olds. Those expecting a pulpy plot twister might just as well expect ""Raging Bull"" to be about boxing.
Woody Harrelson stars as Carter, delivering his most daring performance since ""The People vs. Larry Flint."" Although he dabbles in real estate, Carter - son of a famous congressman - is a professional ""walker,"" a term coined for Nancy Reagan's escort, Jerry Zipkin. The film's opening scene fleshes out his duties best.
Opening in a luxurious dining room rotunda, the camera pans along elegant wallpaper, glittering with pretension amidst the sound of incoherent jabbering. Eventually, the mindless prattle peters beneath the feathery, Truman Capote-ish coo of Carter Page III: ""If all the pricks that stuck her were sticking out of her, she'd be a porcupine."" A smug, harpy laughter spreads like cancer and the camera reveals a self-described coven of bejeweled women, a game of canasta and their gesticulating busybody.
The symbiotic chatter sessions provide a refreshing sanctuary of wit and companionship for the neglected wives while giving Carter an escape from a world of homophobic prejudice and his dead father's -ever looming shadow.
Everything seems headed for a scathing satire of Washington's bourgeoisie until one of Carter's club (played by Kristin Scott Thomas) is implicated in the murder of a lobbyist - her secret lover. When Carter helps conceal the incriminating evidence, the story quickly spins into ""The Big Shots vs. Carter Page.""
Luckily, Schrader only uses this predictable plot as a launching pad for examining Carter's complexities and eccentricities (His motto is: ""I'm not naive. I'm superficial.""), and as things unfold, the audience doesn't collect clues so much as we investigate Carter, his morality struggle and his relationship to Emek (Mortiz Bleibtreu), a struggling artist.
Like many films this year, ""The Walker"" insists on injecting itself with political commentary, including frequent references to Iraq, Emek's obsession with Abu Ghraib photography and a crooked vice president (Ned Beatty), who bears obvious resemblance to his real life counterpart.
Damned by subtleties, poor publicity and an ending that fizzles after the film's initial pop, ""The Walker"" seems doomed to be forgotten or grossly under-rated despite its clever script and strong, veteran cast.
In an interview with MoviesOnline, Schrader said, ""It's a lot easier to finance and sell a movie about a 20 year old with a gun [Travis Bickle in ""Taxi Driver""] than it is a 50 year old with a lavender kerchief in his pocket.""
Harrelson is no DeNiro, but his performance in ""The Walker"" deserves Oscar recognition and makes this film worthy of, if nothing else, a weekend rental.
