If you’ve been on Netflix in the last few weeks, you’ve probably spotted one of their latest originals, “I Care A Lot.”
Maybe you debated checking it out or passed it up as another Netflix original clogging up your streaming feed.
But if you’re someone who’s interested but found yourself turned off by the trailer’s portrayal of a corrupt court-appointed guardian preying on the innocent elderly, I promise there’s so much more to it.
The film follows Marla Greyson, played by Golden Globe winner Rosamund Pike, a court appointed guardian who has created an intricate legal scam to pay herself.
Greyson preys on older people with solid finances and could questionably be found unfit to care for themselves.
Through bribing medical professionals to diagnose current patients as unfit to live alone and convincing gullible judges to place them in her care, Greyson acquires the perfect “cash cows” out of her wards, placing them in nursing homes, isolating them from their family members, and liquidating their assets to profit off of their life savings.
Marla can be described as scrappy street fighter meets business badass, dressed in bold suits, a sharp blond bob, and her ever present vape pen (which some say is a nod to her former vape business).
She loves the finer things in life, as seen in her expensive cars and lavish living style. Greyson, along with business partner and lover Fran, Eliza Gonzalez, make for the perfect power couple.
Their life seems to be untouchable, especially when a morally questionable doctor, Alicia Watt, presents Marla with a “cherry” to take the place of one of Marla’s wards who unexpectedly died.
This “cherry” is a woman with no family and extremely deep pockets, someone Marla has to have. Within weeks, Marla has obtained guardianship of Jennifer, Dianne Wiest, sold all of her belongs, and gained access to her safety deposit box, where Marla finds a carefully hidden, and legally uninsured, bag of diamonds. It seems Marla and Fran have stumbled onto an even greater gold mine.
Of course, things tend to spiral fairly quickly when Jennifer misses a visit with her son, a powerful crime boss, Roman Lunyov , Peter Dinklage.
From there the movie shifts from a story about the carefully crafted life Marla has created to how she could quickly lose it all in her fight for Jennifer against Jennifer’s powerful allies.
This movie is more than just one about a woman’s journey to fortune on the backs of the weak (her wards). It becomes a battle for power between two heads of immoral financial empires, a battle of evil-against-evil.
It leave the viewer struggling with who to root for: Marla, the underdog who fails to be bullied or the dangerous and violent Russian mafia leader who just wants his mother back.
Blakeson crafts a compelling dark comedy that keeps viewers laughing at the insanity of it, questioning the morality of the world we live in, and maybe hating themselves for hoping that both of these characters get the happy ending they don’t deserve.