truth hurts...

Rating: 3/10 (17 December 2004)

Fletcher Reede (Jim Carrey), is a lawyer who is estranged from his wife Audrey (Maura Tierney). His occupations maintain him far from his home and particularly from his son Max. But he really loves him. One day, for his birthday, Max wishes that his father can't lie for 24 hours. His wish will come true since for 24 hours, Reede will be through a living hell. One must suffer to improve oneself...
With "Liar Liar", the authors set themselves the following target: to conceive a tailor-made movie for Jim Carrey. Why? Because they surely realized that their topic was thin and it would pose problems to write a screenplay holding water. So, to compensate for the very reduced potential of the script they decided to give Carrey a free hand and to leave a very important part of the film in his hands. Thus, the actor, once revealed with "the Mask" (1994) gets out again, without trying to bring anything new to his acting his comical elements that secured his success. It means: his grimaces, his showy expressions and his implausible cues for a kind of one man-show which often borders on the unacceptable. Carrey does his best to bring an ounce of credibility to his character but his bombastic (the term is weak) performance only succeeds in massacring the film. Worse, his third-rate acting is so significant that it leaves little place to the other actors' acting. Actors who try with difficulty to play opposite Carrey.
This poor comedy shows once again that exclusively relying on a main actor to save a film can be a serious mistake. Fortunately, it seems that Carrey after this flick wanted to give the image of a conscientious actor capable to direct his career. Indeed, we will see him holding more serious roles where he will be able to restrain his tendency to third-rate acting. Try "the Truman Show" (1998), "Man on the Moon" (1999) or more recently "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" (2004). Let's hope he goes on and perseveres in this way.