King of the Hill | |
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Directed by | Steven Soderbergh |
Screenplay by | Steven Soderbergh |
Based on | King of the Hill by A.E. Hotchner |
Produced by |
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Starring | |
Cinematography | Elliot Davis |
Edited by | Steven Soderbergh |
Music by | Cliff Martinez |
Production companies |
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Distributed by | Gramercy Pictures |
Release date |
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Running time | 103 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Budget | $8 million |
Box office | $1.2 million |
King of the Hill is a 1993 American drama film written and directed by Steven Soderbergh. It is the second he directed from his own screenplay following his 1989 Palme d'Or-winning film Sex, Lies, and Videotape. It too was nominated for the Palme d'Or, at the 1993 Cannes Film Festival. [1]
Based on the Depression-era bildungsroman memoir of writer A. E. Hotchner, the film follows the story of a boy struggling to survive on his own in a hotel in St. Louis after his mother enters a sanatorium with tuberculosis and his younger brother is sent to live with an uncle. His father, a German immigrant and traveling salesman working for the Hamilton Watch Company, is off on long trips from which the boy cannot be certain he will return.
On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes , 91% of 33 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 7.8/10.The website's consensus reads: "A subtle, affecting, character-driven coming-of-age story, King of the Hill is one of Steven Soderbergh's best and most criminally overlooked films." [2] Metacritic , which uses a weighted average , assigned the film a score of 86 out of 100, based on 12 critics, indicating "universal acclaim". [3]
In her review in The New York Times , Janet Maslin says, "The film does a lovely job of juxtaposing the sharp contrasts in Aaron's life, and in marveling at the fact that he survives as buoyantly as he does." [4]
King of the Hill grossed $1.2 million domestically (United States and Canada), [5] against a production budget of $8 million.[ citation needed ]
Steven Andrew Soderbergh is an American film director, producer, screenwriter, cinematographer, and editor. A pioneer of modern independent cinema, Soderbergh later drew acclaim for formally inventive films made within the studio system.
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