The Background
When fate gives you a hard time and when lady luck ignores you for a long time, every man (unless if he is an atheist) turns his head to the sky and asks ’’God help me’’ or ’’why me?’’. Some even might say ’’Give me strength to stand this blizzard". But not Bruce Nolan (Jim Carrey). He thinks that god is doing a lousy work on earth and insists that god is ’’ignoring him completely’’ and ’’god is a mean kid sitting on an ant hill with a magnifying glass and he is not it’’...
The Story
Bruce Nolan is a small TV News reporter in Buffalo, New York. His is a uninteresting job as a ’’human interest’’ reporter for the news station, which obviously he hates. His aim is to become a News Anchor and then reach the upper echelons of the company. But then, Lady Luck keeps atleast 100 miles distance from him!!!. Now things aren’t that great at the home front, though he is blessed with a patient and loving girlfriend, Grace (Jennifer Anniston), but a lousy dog which has its own mind when it comes to peeing!! Poor thing lacks ’’etiquette’’ and this makes Bruce even more agitated!!!
Bruce blows the top when a rival reporter is promoted to be the anchor and ultimately loses his job. If that’s not bad, he gets whacked by a bunch of rowdies, when he attempts to help a beggar from these guys. Oh that’s not it, he also manages to crash his car while returning home. That’s it? Not at all, things hit him hard and sharp words come out of his mouth in front of his girlfriend. He complains to her that his life is ’’mediocre’’ and almost loses him.
That’s when he gets a pager message from ’’God’’. Not knowing who, he tries to lose the pager, but as they say, God works in mysterious ways!!! The pager thrown on the road, breaks into pieces, but still beeps!! Inquisitive Bruce calls that number only to be shocked to see that its an Auto Voice that calls him ’’Bruce’’ and tells him to come to 77256, 23rd street. Bruce reaches the building ’’Omni Presents’’ and climbs upto the floor only to find an huge empty hall and a janitor swiping the door.
From there on its all predictable antics, revenge, preaching and finally the ’’Lesson of the Century’’ : You make life miserable for yourself, don’t blame god for that. Oh come on, that’s cliché. We have seen that quite many a times in quite a few movie...Anyway here is the analysis..
Story (3/5)
Nothing unique isn’t it? Daa. This has been touched by many people and all ended up being a preacher and this one is no different. I’m not saying the story sucks, actually its ok. But what I feel is it aint new and it aint path breaking. Guy on a bad patch, gets fired, blames god, god gives him power, guy ends up in a mess, god preaches ’’its aint easy to do my job’’, guy learns his mistake, thanks god and everybody lives happily ever after. Full stop.
Cast (3/5)
Jim Carrey : Carrey probably didn’t get that much to use his trade mark facial histrionics. But he does tickle the viewer’s ribs quite a few times. Otherwise he successfully plays the role as a ’’Loser’’ as always!!! He had some box office disaster in the recent past, when he tried to become a serious actor. So the grape vines say that he claims this as his ’’come back movie’’ to become once again the ’’comedy blockbuster king’’.
Jennifer Anniston : Somebody said she is just their for a ’’blonde’’ attraction. Actually she does a little more than that. We don’t see a ’’Rachel’’ out there, but a caring girlfriend who loves and respects Bruce..
Morgan Freeman : Can somebody tell me, Is God all this humorless and always in pain? Did anyone tell Freeman that he is playing ’’God’’ and for ’’his’’ sake, he could show some ’’Power walk’’ and also put a lot of smile on his face??? Remember that voice that Moses hears in Ten Commandments, well That’s like God. This guy delivers dialogues in the same way he did in Chain Reaction, in Deep Impact, in ’’Seven’’ and in Shawshank Redemption!!! But Freeman gets pretty good lines in this movie than what other ’’Gods’’ had in movies like Oh God, Religion Inc., Dogma, Time Bandits etc.
Carell : I think this guy had good potential in displaying pretty good action. But he never got a chance. Only in the sequence when Bruce takes his revenge on Live News, this guy has put in a lot of effort to imitate Jim Carrey (its Bruce who is making him to do it remember). Wonderful effort.
Direction (3/5)
One element that stands out in the whole movie is the beggar who appears on the screen with something or other on the board. It was not great, but it did make its point. I can imagine the director pushing the actors beyond their capabilities (which never happened in this movie), but how did he manage to make the Dog act? Or is it special effects?
Comedy (4/5)
This is not a hilarious movie of Jim Carrey’s legendary style. But it does have its trademark punch lines and actions. Here are some of the Good Comedy Scenes in this movie..
B E A Utiful (I loved this one)
When he asks for a sign from god while driving
The Looooong file cabinet and Bruce searching if it is a trick!!
The ’’How many finger sequence’’
The Soup sequence in the Diner (Ten Commandments style)
The Monkey from the ’’behind’’ sequence and ’’Go home’’ part (god, it was the best)
The sequence Bruce leaves his clothes in a stroke (man, this was terrific)
and quite many...
Final Verdict (4/5)
I wanted to make it 3.5 but there aint no 0.5 in MS. So will round it up to 4/5!!. Well the comedy is good, but it is not the superlative stuff which we normally expect from Carrey. The story is very predictable but still funny. The cast is unimpressive (excluding Carey) but ok for this movie.
Darling, atleast this is not an endless sequel filled with on-your-face special effects or a bunch of girls blowing things around. This one is funny, if not hilarious, and that’s all reason enough for you to get this DVD on a Saturday Night....