Mar 20, 2001 05:01 AM
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The Farrelly Brothers seem to be stuck in a rut of releasing movies which try to outdo each previous offering on shock factor. 'There's Something About Mary' which shocked everyone with its 'penis-caught-in-a-zipper' and 'sperm-hanging-from-the-ear' gags now seems pretty tame when compared to this their more recent offering. The Farrellies insist that they test their movies out to see whether their gags do actually offend people or whether they find them funny, and if they offend then they remove them. I don't know who they tested this movie on but I found some parts of the movie went way beyond the generally acceptable levels of taste and decency.
I'll explain the plot before I get to what it is exactly which I dislike about this movie.
Jim Carey plays Charlie, a stomach-churningly nice highway patrolman who appears to have the perfect life until his wife runs off with a vertically challenged limousine driver leaving him with 3 children who are obviously not his own. Eventually Charlie snaps, developing a second personailty which takes over at awkward moments. ‘Hank’, is rude, abrasive and downright disgusting and eventually Charlie is diagnosed with schizophrenia. Still in his position as a highway patrolman, Charlie is given the task of escorting Irene Waters(Renee Zellweger) to New York to face charges for a crime she didn’t commit. He (and Hank) falls for her and he swallows her story. The rest of the film is devoted to them avoiding the bad guys whilst attempting to clear her name.
OK so the plot is a little more complicated than this but if you read the rest of this review and pay any attention to it then you probably won’t care to see the movie anyway unless you are a really big Jim Carey fan.
Now the reasons I have for disliking this movie are actually many. The Farrelly brothers seem to try to be more and more controversial with each movie and this one just about pushes things too far whilst not being in the slightest bit funny either. The crude jokes are to be expected now from anything they release and anyone going to see their movies must expect this but some things here were a little too disgusting and not particularly funny. Carey himself was said to be highly embarassed about performing a scene which involves him pushing aside a breastfeeding baby and then taking its place suckling at the woman’s breast(he is later seen riding away with a ‘milk moustache’). Now I am no prude but this, as with many other moments, simply were not handled in a way which made them remotely funny.
Another problem aside from the crude sexual content was the foul language. Surely as a society we have moved away from finding F**k a hilarious substitute to a decent funny line. Perhaps not, as we still see that many stand-up comedians base their entire act around swearing every couple of seconds before their audience who stand there giggling inanely at how naughty he/she is being. Carey’s children do nothing but swear continuously throughout the movie and I’ve read and heard people saying how funny this is and how they steal the show from Carey. Come on people, grow up! Swearing is sadly no substitute for humour.
Carey puts in his usual manic, rubber-faced performance but even he can make a bad movie - this is it.
The whole plot revolves around one gag - Carey’s schizophrenia - and it simply isn’t good enough to carry the whole film along. It is a shame that he would lower himself to this level of humour on his return to comedic acting after his serious outing into ‘The Truman Show’. It is a further shame that the Farrelly brothers who produced the very funny ‘Kingpin’ have to keep trying to push the boundaries all the time rather than making funny movies. Both actor and directors are very talented but in this movie do little to show that. It is simply crude and offensive and although there are some good ideas here and some undoubtably funny moments, its offensiveness ruins the entire effect.
Go and rent ‘Liar Liar’ or ‘Kingpin’ for better examples of their work but avoid this movie.
