Max (Dan Wyllie), science teacher, and his wife Therese (Bojana Novakovic), tax accountant, take extreme measures to deal with their loud, lowlife neighbor, a drug dealer who originates many troubles.
The King is Dead!, while not as brilliant as Bad Boy Bubby or Alexandra's Project, shares with those films a unique and perverse vision of Australian suburbia ... De Heer's always bold, and here he's bold again. The Independent King is certainly not dead.
If this film had a more propulsive plot, veered into Straw Dogs territory and retained its dark laughs, I imagine we would be talking about an Australian classic.
Black comedies rarely come as carefully measured or as full-blooded as this marvellously engaging lark, which is essentially a revenge fantasy for anyone who has ever suffered the prolonged trauma of living with a bad neighbour.
The King is Dead! is a deliciously dark genre mash-up, coy and explorative but tight and insular, sprayed with wry laughs and a genuinely foreboding undertone.
