Wrestling With Andy

Rating: 4/10 (3 February 2005)

There's a scene in this biopic about the life and career of comedian Andy Kaufman when Kaufman and his creative partner Bob Zmuda tell their agent, George Shapiro, about a prank they played years ago, hiring actors to run around a zoo yelling that a lion had gotten loose, and watching everyone run.
I can see the headline now: "12 Killed In Zoo Stampede Panic; Comedy Frontiers Extended."
Andy Kaufman was a very brilliant comedian. He wasn't always funny, and sometimes was just weird for the sake of it, but he had an amazing talent that created something remarkable in show business, a way of reaching the audience for something more than laughter or sympathy. He wanted complete engagement, a shared sense of purpose, even hatred or childlike awe. Laughs were fine, too, but he really just wanted to break down the wall between entertainer and audience, and give people something to take home and think about.
A lot of people took Andy home and thought about him. That's what was so great about him. You really don't need "Man On The Moon" for that. Yes, Jim Carrey captures him in all his guises, such as Latka the star of the TV sitcom "Taxi" and Tony Clifton the bitter lounge singer. You have to marvel at Carrey's talent. Even the way he uses his eyes is spot-on Andy. But everything worthwhile Carrey does in this movie you can see Kaufman himself do in documentaries and video clips.
The main problem with "Man On The Moon" is the story around Carrey, which is a very pedestrian retelling of the various outrageous public moments in Kaufman's career. Carrey as Kaufman introduces the film in a funny bit, telling us they played around with the facts for dramatic purposes and that he doesn't approve. But there's nothing organic or involving in the rejiggered storyline, just a lot of set pieces people already know from seeing the two Kaufman documentaries that did the rounds at Comedy Central back in the day.
There's a "Taxi" montage where we see many of the real cast members playing alongside Carrey, but it doesn't say anything about what Kaufman did on the show to connect with a mass audience for the only time in his career. The assumption going in is everyone watching this film knows we are watching a master at work. Throughout the film, there's a sense of homage being paid which grates.
"You're insane, but you might also be brilliant," his aspiring manager George Shapiro tells him in one of many groaner lines.
Danny DeVito plays Shapiro. DeVito worked with the real Kaufman, and I guess that's a plus, but I don't get why a guy so well-known for playing "Taxi's" Louis DePalma is filmed hovering around the "Taxi" set playing someone else. It's distracting.
Nobody else clicks in the supporting cast, either. Paul Giamatti feels awkward and forced as Kaufman's writer and friend Bob Zmuda. He's too smug, and not enough of a doorway into what makes Andy tick. Courtney Love is awful in the role of Kaufman's squeeze, never really giving us any sense of why she's there and loves him after all the misery he puts her through around the wrestling ring. Does she know if Andy is playing with her? Does she care? She did a good job in director Milos Forman's previous film "The People Vs. Larry Flynt," and you get the sense he either enjoyed working with her or fancied she was a critics' darling.
The film does work more near the end, especially with a giddy Carnegie Hall performance starring Kaufman where the Rockettes, the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, and Santa Claus close the show and Andy takes the audience out for milk and cookies. That's a good moment; it would be a great moment in a better film.