Me, Myself & Irene (2000) 2 stars out of 4. Starring Jim Carrey, Renee Zellweger, Robert Forster, Chris Cooper, Anthony Anderson, Mongo Brownlee, Jerod Mixon and Michael Bowman. Written by Peter Farrelly & Mike Cerrone & Bobby Farrelly. Directed by Bobby Farrelly & Peter Farrelly. Rated R.
The Farrelly brothers are insidious filmmakers. They force you to laugh at situations and behavior that in real life you would feel guilty or ashamed if you had a similar reaction.
That is the depraved genius of these two irrelevant guys. They appeal to everyone''s lowest basic instinct. So, you laugh at a man tied to a tree butt naked with a chicken's head stuck where the sun don't shine.
Or you laugh at three young black men with genius I.Q.s who talk and curse as if they came from the meanest inner city ghetto in America. And it's even funnier when their profanity is in German.
These are just some of the examples of bad taste that abound in "Me, Myself & Irene," Jim Carrey's latest outing, and his first with the Farrellys since "Dumb and Dumber."
Carrey plays Charlie Baileygates, a 17-year veteran of the Rhode Island police force. He is a dedicated, nice guy, who lets everyone walk all over him because he hates confrontation.
Even when he loses his wife who presented him with three black sons by the black, midget chauffeur who drove them to their honeymoon cottage, he maintains his composure and becomes a loving, doting father.
Carrey also plays Hank Baileygates, Charlie's ultra-aggressive alter-ego. Hank loves confrontations, talking dirty, smoking and fighting. He also is as honry as a rooster.
It seems that Baileygates suffers from Split Personality Disorder. Now, schizophrenia is not funny. And people who suffer from it, as well as their friends and relatives, may take offense at "Me, Myself & Irene."
And I agree that such a disease is no laughing matter. But as portrayed by Carrey and written by the Farrellys, with help from Mike Cerrone, no one can really take Carrey or the way he presents this malady as a serious look at the illness.
"Me, Myself & Irene" is just an exercise for more of Carrey's rubber-faced antics and slapstick physical humor. And the Farrellys offer Carrey plenty of opportunities for pratfalls as Hank continually clobbers Charlie.
The movie's plot, which is only serviceable, has Charlie assigned to convey an alleged hit-and-run driver from Rhode Island to upstate New York.
His prisoner, Irene Walters (Renee Zellweger), was framed and was running away from her mobster ex-boyfriend.
Actually, it's not important. What the movie boils down to is an elongated chase with Charlie/Hank taking turns protecting and wooing Irene, as well as Charlie/Hank fighting among himself for the young woman's affections.
Unfortunately, Zellweger, a very good actress as evidenced by her performances in "Jerry Maguire" and "One True Thing," seems adrift basically playing straight woman to Carrey's carrying-ons.
She seems uncomfortable and unsure how to react to the madness going on around her. Her performance is tentative and a bit weak.
The film's true scene-stealers are the three young men who portray Carrey's grown-up sons: Anthony Anderson as Jamaal, Mongo Brownlee as Lee Harvey and Jerod Mixon as Shonte Jr. Their interaction as they profanely debate quantum physics or taunt each other about the universities that accepted them are priceless.
Overall, the film's' pacing is a bit uneven and, at nearly two hours, could have used some tighter editing.
"Me, Myself & Irene" is strictly low-brow, slip-on-a-banana-peel comedy. Its purpose is to make you laugh, even if you chide yourself later for doing so.
Bob Bloom is the film critic at the Journal and Courier in Lafayette,IN. He can be reached by e-mail at bloom@journal-courier.com or at bobbloom@iquest.net Reviews by Bloom, an associate member of the Online Film Critics Society, can be found on the Internet Movie Database at: http://www.imdb.com/M/reviews_by?Bob+Bloom
The review above was posted to the
rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup (de.rec.film.kritiken for German reviews).
The Internet Movie Database accepts no responsibility for the contents of the
review and has no editorial control. Unless stated otherwise, the copyright
belongs to the author.
Please direct comments/criticisms of the review to relevant newsgroups.
Broken URLs inthe reviews are the responsibility of the author.
The formatting of the review is likely to differ from the original due
to ASCII to HTML conversion.
Related links: index of all rec.arts.movies.reviews reviews