If you think about it, “A Hologram for the King” has kind of a high-school story feel to it. Guy ends up in a new place and has to find his feet, with a bunch of missteps along the way. He quickly meets a goofy but clever buddy who helps him navigate his new world. But then he finds himself and gets a girlfriend and the buddy gets left behind. Womp.
Our guy here is Alan Clay (Tom Hanks), who isn’t doing so great. His marriage has fallen apart, he’s still dealing with the aftermath of a long-ago bad business move, and he can’t pay for his daughter to go to college anymore.
He’s sent off to Saudi Arabia to try to sell a holographic teleconferencing system for the king’s exciting new King’s Metropolis of Economy and Trade complex, but when he gets to the “metropolis,” he finds finished roads that go nowhere and just a few buildings on a sandy desert, some gorgeous, some half-complete. His small team is set up in a foodless, Wi-Fi-less tent, his contact is nowhere to be found, and the king hasn’t been to visit in 18-plus months. Yeesh. Alan puts on a brave team-leader face, but between challenges there and back home, he struggles.
Luckily, he has Yousef (Alexander Black), who starts off as his driver and ends up his friend. Yousef is cheerful, smart and thoughtful, fond of American music, eager to help in any way he can—and, unfortunately, caught up in a flirtation with a married woman, whose husband he fears is out to get him. It’s one of the movie’s several weird side points that gets attention now and then but never really goes anywhere, but it’s not too distracting. Yousef takes Alan under his wing, showing him around and cheering him up. It’s a great friendship.
But then, love. After a botched attempt at self-surgery (careful, blood-phobes), Alan finds himself in the care of Dr. Zahra Hakem (Sarita Choudhury). You see their romance coming from a mile away, but when it finally blossoms after a few rough starts, it’s sweet, marked by smiles and emailed flirtations.
Hanks is at home in this role, playing a guy who’s awkward and troubled but ultimately well-meaning. He doesn’t over-emote, and actually emotes rather masterfully; one of the most memorable scenes is one in which he lets out an under-his-breath “[bleep]” in the dark doorway of his new bare-bones workspace then slowly rearranges his face into a smile as he walks into the light, meeting his team cheerfully, as if nothing is wrong.
“Hologram” doesn’t try to provide much commentary on Saudi Arabian culture (and maybe it should, maybe it shouldn’t), but at least it doesn’t appear to cause any harm, either. Alan is largely respectful of the culture, but if he says or does something that’s insensitive or based on prejudice, he’s called out on it, either by another character directly or by the way the film presents the reaction to his missteps. When the movie makes jokes about cultural differences, Alan is usually the butt of them, not the culture itself, and jokes that target the culture are mostly made by the people who are part of it. That’s splitting hairs, maybe, but it makes a difference in the tone of the film, for the better.
Overall, “Hologram,” based on a novel of the same name by Dave Eggers and written and directed by Tom Tykwer, who co-directed “Cloud Atlas” with the Wachowskis, isn’t anything super special. It skips from point to point, has uneven pacing, cracks a few cringe-worthy jokes and sort of flubs the ending. But the characters are well-developed and likeable, the laughs are genuine, the music is good and there are generally plenty of warm fuzzies to be had. And let’s be real; the movie stars Tom Hanks. Sometimes, that’s enough.
2.5 stars. Rated R.
See it: Opens Friday at AMC River East 21 (322 E. Illinois St. 312-596-0333), Landmark Century Centre Cinema (2828 N. Clark St. 773-248-7759) and Century Evanston 12 (1715 Maple Ave., Evanston, 847-491-9751), as well as several suburban theaters.
@gauxmargaux | mhenquinet@redeyechicago.com
