shoolaroon Review of Dangerous Parking

Dangerous Parking (2007)

Bitterly funny and achingly sad, a remarkable movie!

[10/10 · 28 May 2012]

I may be going overboard with the rating, but I would definitely give it no less than 8, and I want to encourage people to see this movie. I kind of rolled my eyes at the beginning as I thought it was a bit indulgent and over the top, but once the story got rolling, I was captivated by the lead character, British filmmaker Noah Arkwright, and his stumbling battle towards both sobriety and becoming a family man. Noah is so abrasive, profane and cynical, that while he's bitingly funny, at first you don't feel much sympathy. He reminded me of Gordon Ramsay. But when he's in the sober house and encounters the spirit of his mother, who died at his birth, I found myself deeply touched as well. We assume so much about people but it turns out we really don't know them at all and why they turned out a certain way. Noah meets the right woman and has a lovely child, but his past life of debauchery starts to catch up with him in the form of recurrent bouts of cancer. Even at its darkest this film never loses its humor or its humanity. The last half hour or so can be quite harrowing with Noah's medical treatments, but it's never depressing. The end is really, really well done and surprising, and really touched me. I don't think I will ever forget this film, and I'm eager to find my own copy now. A truly great film about addiction, sickness, spirituality, and the healing power of love.