I've always have had a love/hate appeal to Robin Williams. I hate Robin Williams when he seemingly channels his "sugared" up kid persona, as he jumps from joke to joke, and voice to voice. Sometimes it's endearing, but more often than not it's just plain annoying. Where I tend to love Robin Williams is when he tones things down and channels his energy into more dramatic, introspective roles. If I had a choice, I'd obviously take "Good Will Hunting" Robin Williams over "Patch Adams" Robin Williams. In the case of "World's Greatest Dad", the material on paper seems like the right vehicle for the Robin Williams I like. And I must admit that Mr. Williams is quite good in this particular role, but aside from his performance, the film feels listless in its execution.
Written and directed by Bobcat Goldthwait, "World's Greatest Dad" follows the life of Lance Clayton (Williams), a struggling writer who just can't seem to get anything published. Accompanying his fading dreams of making it big are his struggles to connect with his son Kyle (Daryl Sabara),a vulgar, disrespectful teenager who has a pension for porn and asphyxiation, and his closeted girlfriend. In many respects, Lance's life is a failure by his accounts, but that doesn't stop him from trying to reach that celebrity peak. A peak that Lance eventually reaches through a disturbingly gruesome accident. An accident that will probably make a few people turn the film off. Yet, through this accident, the main points of Goldthwait's film comes through and at times he hits the right notes. Some of the most poignant topics Goldwaith tackles are the desire for fame and the politcal correctness of death. The former comes at the price of human life as Lance's character exploits someone's death as a means to enhance his own reach for the limelight. Such a look by Goldthwait is an interesting one as it dictates how in our society fame and success is the ultimate goal, and more often than not it's reached by any means necessary and at the expense of another.
Yet Goldthwait's exploration doesn't stop there as he also takes a look at how death can change people's preceptions of another. More specifically, when a certain character dies, the people around suddenly gravitate towards deceased and have a changed view of the person they once openly mocked. This is an aspect I find the most interesting about the film because it seems like when anyone dies, people suddenly bury the hatchet and pretend they had some kind of relevant relationship with the now deceased. It's almost as if years of history are sweeped clean and the two distant objects are connected. It's with this idea and the exploration of fame where Goldthwait gets a lot of credit, but for as true as his ideas are, they don't save his film from becoming uneven. Now the film's lack of balance isn't because of its pace. Instead it's skewed because the film is trying to be morbidly hilarious while still trying to cover serious moral ground. Often times this is where a film teeters on the brink of satire and disaster. In the case of "World's Greatest Dad", it goes back and forth between both areas. Certainly its satire is on point, but at times much of the plot points are either overly dramatic or comedically underutilized for the film to be entirely effective.
Furthermore, Goldthwait doesn't seem like he is able to counter his dark moments with timely comedic elements. More specifically, I don't think the film is able to let the scant dramatic moments sink in before Goldthwait moves on to a punch line. Which, for the sake of reiteration, makes the drama and comedy seem cheapened. Yet, these moments shouldn't completely define a film that has some good ideas (especially when they come together in an ending that is applause worthy), a good performance by Williams, and some decent comedy. Certainly the film isn't as precise in its execution as one would like, but it still bolsters some of the most daring moments to be seen in a movie this year.
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