Carrey Wuz Robbed..

Rating: 10/10 (9 February 2014)

I have mixed feelings about Carrey. Blessed with an amazing talent, there was a period just before his career went into orbit when his 3-letter agency was essentially supporting him, providing the cash flow until his career found traction. That does not happen very often, and Carrey was very stressed in this period. But, with hindsight, the bet was a good one and the agency got their money back ... in spades. Carrey's early films (of which this is one, and possibly his best) show a true acting genius on top of a comic genius. To this reviewer, the biggest problem with Carrey's outrageous success (and I used the word "outrageous" after some deliberation) is that it priced him out of even most of the A films. (For example, one reason there was no sequel to THE MASK which, let's face facts, was a brilliant film, as was Carrey in it) is that even the sequel to a "known hit" could not guarantee for the suits enough box office to cover Carrey's new super-fee. And now let's talk about Kaufman. Decades later, there are things about the man we still don't know. (Trivia fact -- Kaufman had an unnatural fear of cancer, and used to eat a handful of almonds a day based on advice from a mystic who himself lived 100 years ago. Ironically, the thing he most feared got him ... anyway.) With the exception of the Golden Globes, every other nomination Carrey received for this, arguably one of the greatest performances of the last century, came back snake eyes. There was even gossip to the effect that Carrey's performance was so pitch perfect, so dead-on, that it actually scared the judges. Too bad. What you have here, aside from one of the most entertaining biopics of all time (makes Spacey's take on Bobby Darin look like a comic book in comparison) is one astonishing man portraying another astonishing man. If that does not deserve a "10," then nothing does...