The Cable Guy (1996) A movie review by Serdar Yegulalp Copyright 1997 by Serdar Yegulalp
CAPSULE: Strangely unfunny Jim Carrey comedy that starts off on an interesting note, but goes flat-footed in a muddled comic commentary on the power of the media.
I watched two Jim Carrey movies back to back: one was the hysterical LIAR LIAR, which I nearly watched from the inside of an oxygen tent from gasping for air, and the other was the oddball CABLE GUY, which has the hints of a far better movie inside of it somewhere. Maybe even three or four.
Matthew Broderick stars as a fellow who has broken up with his girlfriend and is now in a bachelor pad. He calls to get cable TV installed, and the installer who shows up -- Carrey, predictably -- turns out to be a hyperthyroid weirdo who insists on insinuating himself in the guy's life. At first this works -- Carrey's character is strange, but seems to have a weird grain or three of common sense rattling around in his head somewhere. Or is it all a sham?
The movie isn't interested in questions like that. It quickly busies itself with a background subplot about a big-headline "tabloid TV" murder trial, and we also soon learn that most of the Carrey character's outlook has been shaped -- mutated? -- by TV. I thought about the splendid BEING THERE, which started from roughly the same premise, but wasn't nearly as labored or contrived as this movie. And in this movie, that's just one of many, many confused and conflicting ingredients.
The single biggest problem is a failure of tone. At first the movie is just goofy and offbeat, but then it gets dark. Dark and unpleasant, too, which is not what a comedy needs. The Carrey characters turns out not to be a cable company employee at all, and then freaks out, goes on a rampage, steals the girl, etc.... in short, the movie indulges in developments that are just out of desperation on the part of the screenwriters.
Broderick is fine in his role. Carrey is actually not bad, either, but he has not been given a character to play, but a gimmick, and a thin one at that. I was hoping that the movie would define itself quickly and stay with it -- maybe the cable guy is going to help this fellow get back together with his girl? maybe something really wonderful and unpredictable would happen? -- but nothing of the kind turned out.
Even the big climax is wrong, and I'll happily ruin it because there's not much else to talk about here. The Carrey character winds up falling onto a microwave satellite dish just as the verdict in the big murder trial is about to hit the air. The signal goes dead. And in what the filmmakers probably thought was an intelligent touch, one of the TV viewers reaches for a book instead. All it said to me was that these people have damned short attention spans. The rest of the movie is flawed in the same way.
Two out of four coaxial connections.
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