Carrey soars to the Moon, unfortunately movie doesn't

Rating: Null/10 (22 December 1999)

Given the fact that "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" is permanently ensconced in my personal Top 10 movies of all time, I was anxiously awaiting Milos Forman's latest directorial work "Man On The Moon" starring Jim Carrey. The movie is a bio-pic of the life of former Taxi and Saturday Night Live star Andy Kaufman. In follow-up to his dazzling performance in "The Truman Show," Carrey is once again excellent in his depiction of the eccentric superstar. There are many great supporting performances in this film including Danny DeVito as Kaufman's agent George Shapiro, and Paul Giamatti ("Saving Private Ryan," " Private Parts") as Kaufman's partner in mayhem Bob Zmuda. The movie is filled with cameos from the cast of Taxi and Saturday Night Live, and even the performance of grunge queen Courtney Love is pretty good. Given all of these great performances, the movie remains only slightly better than average. With the exception of the scenes involving Tony Clifton (Carrey) the movie is slow and, much like Kaufman himself, difficult to figure out. Andy Kaufman may have been a comic genius and pioneer, but the story of his life itself is not all that interesting. The audience struggles to try to figure out what Kaufman is all about much like his agent Shapiro does. Carrey's performance is incredible, but when playing strictly the character of Andy Kaufman, his role is neither exciting nor funny. The movie will probably garner some Oscar buzz given the track record of Forman ("Cuckoo's Nest", "Amadeus"), and in deference to the Academy's overlooking Carrey for the Truman show. However, "Man On The Moon" is at best a mildly entertaining biography that is at times hilarious, but at others down-right boring.
6 out of 10 based solely on the great perfomances and the Tony Clifton sightings.