It Don’t Get Any ’’BIGGER!’’
The Farelly brothers did it again!!!
The Czars of Comedy have come up with another side splitting , rib tickling, laugh riot!
....and they call it
“ Shallow Hal !
This one’s about Hal , (Black, in a super role! ) who as a kid , is advised by his dying father, to have high aspirations and settle for nothing mediocre!
so what!.....sounds familiar
But hold it!! His dad is talking about.....WOMEN!!!!
And so Hal grows up to be a real girl-crazy man who pub hops and dances...or rather..tries to dance..with all the hot babes out there only to be shunned by all and sundry!! Even his sexy neighbour, Jill, doesn’t find him any good. Well, Hal’s not alone……he has a friend who is pretty much the same! Life goes on for Hal, when he is stranded with a new-age guru in an elevator and reveals his life to him.
The guru, in an attempt to help Hal, hypnotises Hal such that he will always “see” only the inner beauty of people and not their superficial , skin deep appearance. And then we have good ol’ Hal cavorting with obese and ugly women in a pub, coz he sees them as svelte and sexy! Hal eventually falls in love with Rosemary, the hyper-obese daughter of his boss’ boss, because he sees her as a beautiful , prim-n-propah babe ( Gwyneth Paltrow, looking great as ever! ) The events that follow are hilarious, to say the least! Hal’s friend , tired of Hal’s idiosyncracies finds a way to de-hypnotise him, therefore enabling Hal to see Rosemary in her true self! But now Hal’s in conflict…….what does he choose……the high standards imbibed in him by his dying father….or the fat Rosemary, with a beautiful soul ! The film keeps you in splits till the very end. It indulges in a lot of verbal humor. Scenes to particularly watch out for the chair breaking scenes and the “BIG” splash by Paltrow. Hal’s discovery of the real Rosie is also good!
Now seriously, the film does have a message too!
It , ever so subtly, advises us to rise above the superficial and transcend to the spiritual…..to see people as souls rather than bodies of flesh and bone……….and to judge them by their soul rather than assess them at face value! Moreover, the film also portrays the issue of physical disability in new light…comical, but not cynical, and depicts a lighter side of dealing with such touchy issues!
All in All………….worth a watch!!!!