A career low

Rating: 4/10 (20 December 2008)

"Yes Man" confirms what you already thought about Jim Carrey's career. It's struggling and it's struggling bad. His movies hinge on him, I get that. He's supposed to be his wild and zany self and the rest is supposed to work itself out but jeeze, in the past he's at least gotten workable premises. Now he's worrying about the number 23 and yelling yes to everything and everyone. "Yes Man" marks his career-low, a movie so awe-inspiringly bad at times that I just wanted to walk out and try to remember the good times with Carrey that now seem so far removed.
He plays Carl Allen, a lonely, sad-sack whose been avoiding his two best friends (Bradley Cooper, Danny Masterson) and refusing to go out at all since his wife dumped his boring, say-no-to-everything-ass. He works in a bank approving loans, a perfect job for him since he declines all of those people too. But on advice from a friend, Carl is invited to some crazy seminar run by some crazy guru (Terence Stamp) with some crazy ideas about saying yes to everything. Carl buys into it and soon all of his yes's are opening doors to different opportunities, including a date with a free-spirited musician/photographer/exercise teacher/missionary worker (you get it, she's a free spirit) named Allison (Zooey Deschanel).
The problem with this movie is that the yeses also open the doors to the jokes. One involves him having to give a homeless man a ride (the homeless man also kills his cell-phone battery, which is the big laugh pay-off I suppose). Another yes gets him into a bar-fight. One more leads to him repeatedly and hyperactively shouting out "Red Bull." And the near walk-out moment for me was the old lady who offers him oral sex. And I don't even want to get into his sing-a-long of Third Eye Blinds "Jumper", as he's trying to get a man off the ledge. If anyone finds this ludicrous and near desperate material funny, consider getting an MRI on Monday right away.
Which brings me to Carrey, who really has to go above and beyond here to even get the few chuckles he does get. He wraps tape around his face, dresses up like Harry Potter, drives a motorcycle bare-assed through the street but not once does this premise allow him the same thing he was allowed in "Liar Liar", a movie a lot of others have compared this to. It just looks like he's doing random things for the sake of doing them here, whereas in "Liar Liar" his schtick fit in better. I used to be a big fan of this guy but it looks like his great dramatic work in "Truman Show" and "Man on the Moon" has dissipated into things like "The Number 23" and his comedic career all hinges on doing another movie with Charlie Kaufman.
And Zooey Deschanel is no help. She looks much younger than Carrey, can't match him in energy at all, and sounds as if she's drowsy. If she's watching this movie, I can understand why. "Yes Man" is one of the worst comedies and movies I've seen all year long.