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The King (2017)
Forty years after the death of Elvis Presley, a musical road trip across America in his 1963 Rolls Royce explores how a country boy lost his authenticity and became a king while his country lost her democracy and became an empire.
4 October 1973, Newbury Park, California, USA
24 May 1945, Brooklyn, New York City, New York, USA
20 September 1968, Jackson, Tennessee, USA
15 June 1945, Gaffney, South Carolina, USA
14 June 1946, New York City, New York, USA
21 December 1937, New York City, New York, USA
3 April 1961, Brooklyn, New York City, New York, USA
February 6, 1942 in Memphis, Tennessee, USA
12 December 1915, Hoboken, New Jersey, USA
30 January 1882, Hyde Park, New York, USA
7 February 1978, Cedar Rapids, Iowa, USA
31 October 1931, Wharton, Texas, USA
3 April 1924, Omaha, Nebraska, USA
4 September 1925, Anniston, Alabama, USA
9 October 1940, Liverpool, Lancashire, England, UK
21 June 1985, New York City, New York, USA
15 December 1943, Boston, Massachusetts, USA
23 May 1950, Memphis, Tennessee, USA
30 June 1966, Brooklyn, New York City, New York, USA
April 7, 1915 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA
25 May 1963, Scarborough, Ontario, Canada
December 27, 1931 in Gadsden, Tennessee, USA
October 09, 2018
Elvis Presley's 1963 Rolls-Royce serves as a metaphor for what 's wrong with this country in two-time Sundance Grand Jury winner Eugene Jarecki's new documentary.July 13, 2018
Provocative and at times unwieldy, The King is something of a stoned CNN Special Report on wheels.June 26, 2018
...the movie does so in painfully simplistic terms, with encyclopedia-style snippets of history, authentically pained but insubstantial musings on "how we got here," and an odd reliance on the comments of celebrities who lack any Presley connection...September 05, 2018
It's all rather random, but never dull.October 11, 2018
Elvis is clearly used as a metaphor by Jarecki. Undeniably progressive in his approach and his politics, the filmmaker still crafts a compelling portrait that reaches beyond simply ideology.July 27, 2018
The insistence may inspire a furrowed brow here, a rolled eye there, and a shaken fist or knowing nod over yonder, but there's enough earnest comment and good music to make the effort worth seeing and chewing over.July 12, 2018
Filmmaker Eugene Jarecki does something rather unusual with The King, which becomes something extraordinary and insightful.October 10, 2018
A compelling portrait of Elvis Presley that contemplates what he meant to America and its ever-evolving dream.August 27, 2018
The King is a visual essay - it proposes a thesis, then builds a convincing argument, bouncing between Presley's life and the state of the nation.June 28, 2018
With an insistence that borders almost comically on obsession, [director Eugene Jarecki] forces the singer's life into a larger theory of national decline-the American dream is dead, and Elvis is the emblem of its passing.September 05, 2018
Jarecki's road-trip never reaches answers or a destination, but it's a curiously diverting ride.July 12, 2018
At its best, "The King" is a fever dream of American glory and American weirdness - between which there can be an even thinner line than the one separating love from hate.