Don’t Like: Billy Mitchell

He’s the asshat on the left.

I finally got around to seeing The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters last night and it was really a great little documentary. It’s odd that a movie about world record Donkey Kong attempts could end up becoming a movie about the fickle nature of simple human decency. The film follows nice-guy Steve Weibe, a family man laid off from his job, as he attempts to break the world record in Donkey Kong. He mostly ends up having to deal with a whole bunch of bureaucratic BS, most of which stems from the original record holder and all-around-dick Billy Mitchell.

The guy is very definition of following: smarm, ego, opportunist, jerk-ass, scumbag, incumbent power holder, transparent, and above all hypocrite. He may even have a chance to go down as one of the all-time great hypocrites too. He’s the perfect villain and he completely puts himself into that role. I don’t think I’ve ever disliked a single person more. The best part of the whole thing is how, when pitted against a genuine human being like Steve, all of those awful things about Billy come through so clearly that slowly his co-horts start to realize the truth. Like I said, it really gets into the power of decency.

Definitely, check out King of Kong.