I Care a Lot

I Care a Lot (2021) is about a woman who takes legal guardianship of old people and empties their assets. Marla Grayson has built a system: she works with doctors, finds isolated and wealthy elderly people, submits reports to the court saying they cannot manage, and is appointed guardian. Then she places them in a care home, takes their phone, sells their house and books the money as fees. All of it is legal. She finds a new target: a wealthy woman who appears to have nobody. Then it turns out she has a son, and the son runs a Russian criminal organisation. The most uncomfortable thing is that this is not invented. Abuse of the guardianship system in America is a real problem and has been investigated for years; the film is built on it. Marla is never forgiven and the film does not make a hero of her; but her opponent is at least as bad and the audience has nobody to hold onto. Rosamund Pike won a Golden Globe for the part. Peter Dinklage plays the head of the organisation. The ending caused argument; some viewers feel the film breaks its own moral position in the last ten minutes. The colour and the score are deliberately smooth; the cruelty looks elegant. It was released on Netflix. It runs 118 minutes. Good for: black comedy, thrillers, and criticism of systems. Less good for: nobody is sympathetic and the elder abuse scenes are distressing.