This is representative of writer-director Tom Tykwer’s slightly sunnier take on Dave Eggers’ acclaimed novel, in which struggling salesman Alan travels to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to pitch a virtual reality conferencing system to the king. Unfortunately, Alan is on thin ice with his company, who have only sent him because he has a tenuous in with the royal family, and the delays to his presentation are manifold. Next to Hanks and Tykwer’s previous collaboration, Cloud Atlas, this one looks like the height of simplicity, but believe it or not, there are other grounds for comparison between the two films. While Tykwer and the Wachowskis teamed up to bring David Mitchell’s sprawling six-pronged novel to the screen in hugely underrated style, A Hologram For The King has a similarly literary feel to the way in which it’s converted for a visual medium. Just as Cloud Atlas ‘rhymed’ characters and situations across half a dozen different settings and time periods, the backstory isn’t spoon-fed here, working more like bad memories really do, as Alan reluctantly recalls brief snatches of previous episodes in his career, such as his time as a board member for the doomed Schwinn Bicycle Company. The significance of these brief bits inform his character rather than feeling like exposition dumps. Other reviews have remarked on the miscasting of Hanks in the lead, but we don’t know that we can entirely agree there. Certainly, he’s more of a bumbling Mr Bean type than a man in the throes of self-destructive crisis, but as we’ve said, Tykwer’s take is sunnier than the one on the page. Hanks is always enjoyable to watch and on this adaptation’s own terms, he ensures that you root for Alan just by being there. Even if you wouldn’t peg him for the type to have a mid-life crisis, the film gets some good mileage out of him looking for a change of scene to try and course-correct himself, even though he brings his problems with him. It’s not just a fish out of water movie – he’s genuinely hapless wherever he goes, whether making Lawrence Of Arabia references that go over the heads of his young American tech team or freaking out the locals by joking about freelancing for the CIA. A Hologram For The King is amiable fare but as highlighted in its emphatic opening, Tykwer brings a visual panache that elevates the film just above most Hollywood travelogues of its kind. Any thematic baggage is strictly carry-on only and it feels destined to be a future Pointless answer from Hanks’ filmography, but it’s sometimes quite funny and certainly not without its charms. A Hologram For The King is in UK cinemas now. Follow our Twitter feed for faster news and bad jokes right here. And be our Facebook chum here.
