Grand Theft Parsons

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Grand Theft Parsons ★★ 2003 (PG-13)

Phil Kaufman (Knoxville), manager of legendary country-rock singer Gram Parsons (Macht), has promised to cremate him at Joshua Tree National Monument. But the two are not together when the singer dies and Kaufman must beat out Parson's father (Forster) and greedy girlfriend (Applegate) to get the body first. He enlists the aid of a vivid hippy (Shannon), and the two abscond with the corpse in a brightly painted hearse. Supposedly based upon Kaufman's real-life story, film plays too hard for obvious laughs. Knoxville, Forster, and Shannon give confident performances, but Applegate is a shrill cartoon. Parsons himself seems to get lost somewhere along the way. Sadly, this isn't much of a memorial to the late great artist. 83m/C DVD . US GB Johnny Knoxville, Gabriel Macht, Marley Shelton, Christina Applegate, Robert Forster, Michael Shannon; D: David Caffrey; W: Jeremy Drysdale; C: Bob Hayes; M: Richard G. Mitchell.