An interesting and funny look at an interesting and funny man

Rating: 8/10 (20 February 2014)

Like most of the world, I was introduced to Andy Kaufman through the sitcom Taxi, where he played a goofy foreigner mechanic named Latka Gravas. Given his comedy style on the show, I would never have guessed what a different approach he took to most of his comedy in real life.
Jim Carrey, a fan of Andy Kaufman, is great as Andy, and Andy's alternate persona Tony Clifton. The script is written by Scott Alexander & Larry Karaszewski, writers of biopics Ed Wood and The People vs. Larry Flynt. Like in Ed Wood, humor is used as often as possible as the story moves forward. Danny DeVito (Kaufman's co-star on Taxi) plays Kaufman's manager George Shapiro, and also produced the film. With the exception of Tony Danza (who had a rather strong dislike for Kaufman and felt it would be disingenuous to appear in a film about him), all of the cast members of Taxi make appearances.
This is far from a perfectly factual movie, many events and circumstances portrayed in the film are highly fictionalized and sometimes appear out of order. But while the events portrayed aren't entirely accurate, they aren't meant to be, and the film remains quite true to the spirit of Andy Kaufman.
I recommend this film quite a bit, for both fans and non-fans of Andy Kaufman.