Megan Wood Blog #6 (assigment-K-Pax)

I had never seen K-PAX before, but really enjoyed it, actually. Prot is committed to the Psychiatric Institute of Manhattan after he is found looking suspicious at a train station. After boggling the medical minds of several doctors—seemingly physically and mentally fine yet strange enough to be labeled insane, he meets Mark Powell, who has a feeling that there is something deep inside that causes Prot to act the way he does and feel that he is from another planet.

However, his intricate story, inability to be found contradicting himself, and even reaffirmation of his story under hypnosis, Mark ALMOST begins to believe him, in the way that many others at the hospital do. Mark is insistent however, that there is a reasonable explanation. They wind up helping each other, however. Prot’s assertion that there are no families on K-PAX is one of the many ways that he grieves over the loss of his family in a tragic murder. He has blocked the whole episode out of his mind, making himself an outside observer (from another planet, even), and only fins connection when he spends time with Mark’s family. Mark is constantly absorbed in work, and does not spend enough time with his family.

Ultimately, it is the knowledge of Prots past-life that brings Mark to the realization that his family is the most important thing in his life. Thus, while the film is on the surface about something else, it is really about the importance of family.

One thing that jumped out at me came from a passing conversation had between Mark and Prot. In one scene, Prot is talking to Mark during a regular psychiatric session. Prot makes the observation that Christians and Buddhists claim to believe in their religions, yet don't seem to learn or follow the ways of Buddha or Christ. A rather secular view of Christianity, this comment struck me because of how true it really is. Even the most profoundly devout Christians fail to learn from or apply the ways of Christ as outlined for them in the Bible, in their everyday lives. It’s like many Christians become so hung up on the identity associated with labeling themselves as Christians and their “duty” of letting others know about that, that they forget the point of why they believe what they do, and what it is that they really SHOULD be doing…. Living like Christ. Just a thought…