Thane Economou's film follows the Playboy Playmate's physician through the circus of her life and death, but can't persuade us his experience really merits a movie.
Plus IconTodd Gilchrist
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Andy Warhol famously said that in the future, everyone will have 15 minutes of fame. “Trust Me, I’m A Doctor” expands that tally to an hour and 51 minutes for Sandeep Kapoor, the physician who treated Playboy Playmate Anna Nicole Smith and was implicated in her death from a prescription drug overdose in 2007. That’s too long.
Though it’s difficult to chronicle any element of Smith’s life without injecting at least a hint of tabloid sensationalism, writer-director Thane Economou (“The Wedding Party”) takes an aggressively cheeky approach to the saga of Kapoor’s involvement, in the process undercutting what he clearly intends to be an empathetic portrait of both the doctor and his patient. Taking the lead in a rare film focused on a prominent Indian American, Kal Penn struggles to wrangle this flamboyant biopic into a serious acting challenge, but he delivers impressive work in its final scenes even if they fail to elevate what came before them.
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