Me, Myself and Irene
It's Hard to be the Kings of Comedy
By Christopher Welch

: : : Our Rating : : :

It must suck making a superb opus so early in your career. After all, how will Frank Darabont ever truly top The Shawshank Redemption. How will Bryan Singer ever surpass The Usual Suspects. How can Quentin Tarantino ever hope to one-up Pulp Fiction. How can the Farrelley brothers beat There's Something About Mary. The problem with creating a truly outstanding film as one of your first projects is that people will forever judge everything else you ever do against that one shining movie. Now mind you it is far from impossible to surpass what many will consider something that can never be surpassed. I'm sure people said the same things about Spielberg when he made Jaws, or Scorsese when he made Taxi Driver. Yet I'm sure most people will agree that those were just the starting points in careers that have spawned many more great films, and yes, while no one thought it was possible, even better films than those early excursions. So for all intents and purposes while it may not be easy, it is quite possible to create a movie that can best even the greatest of a film makers earliest works.

Unfortunately Me, Myself, and Irene is not one of these movies. This film unfortunately does not even come close to passing the Farrelly brothers comedic masterpiece There's Something About Mary, or even their two earlier films Kingpin, and Dumb and Dumber. That however is not to say that it isn't a hilarious movie.

If you were to compare Me, Myself, and Irene to most other Hollywood comedies, it more than surpasses them. The movie is genuinely laugh out loud hilarious, and a lot of fun to watch. Jim Carrey once again proves he is one of the best, and most underrated actors of our generation. His turn as Charlie, and his evil alter ego Hank is absolutely side-splitting, and a marvel to behold. In all honestly I think his role in this film is one of the best acting performances I've seen all year. The way he switches from both characters so seamlessly, and yet makes them so entirely different is truly breath taking.

Along with Carrey this film has many other bright spots to mention. The script is witty, and funny, and the dialogue is crisp, and hilarious. The comedic visuals while overtly wrong, are extremely humorous, and all done in the nature of good fun. A rather unexpected high point of the film is Charlie's three gargantuan but extremely intelligent, triplet sons. They by far steal the show, and are even capable of taking some of the spotlight off Carrey. These things, and more make this movie by far one of the funnier movies I've seen all year.

However its also a perfect example of the Farrelly brothers at their weakest. The script for the film is one that they wrote before they even shot Dumb and Dumber. After the success of There's Something About Mary they decided to take another wack at it, and pump it up. Unfortunately as they were doing I can only imagine they were going for something that would rival, if not beat out the film that made them stars. Because of this effort the entire film comes off as just trying too hard. The situations in Me, Myself, and Irene are even more extreme than the utterly wacko situations put forth in "Mary". Being more extreme, doesn't necessarily make them funnier though. Because of their other three films we know that moments like these are going to be coming, and they never truly catch us quite as off guard as they did in the Farrellys earlier works.

The one thing that this film truly lacks that surprisingly enough Dumb, and Dumber, Kingpin, and There's Something About Mary didn't, is heart. This film while funny doesn't have the sweet moral center that the other three films had. Instead its more of your basic, boy meets girl, boy looses girl, boy gets girl routine. While all their other movies are gut bustingly hilarious they also have genuine emotions, and heartfelt sentiments that nicely compliment the raucous comedy. All this film has is the raucous comedy, and it suffers because of that. If you want to laugh, you most definitely will with this movie. Just don't expect to laugh quite as hard as you did, or be quite as touched as you were by the creators' previous works. However watching this you can take heart in the fact that the Farrellys still know how to make a darn fine comedy, and that with a little luck the best is still to come.