Two words: Topsy Kretts. Just. No. If you’re gonna make a movie that relies on as silly a premise as this one, even if it all eventually makes sense and comes together and rises above itself (which, sadly, this doesn’t), you don’t throw a name like that out there in the first half hour. Even if you really have to do that? You don’t later imply that Jim Carrey hadn’t noticed – even if he is clearly a couple of digits short of the number 23.

“We’re not crazy! We circled every 23rd word on every 23rd page and it told us to come down here and … I sound crazy …”

Of course, the first instinct is to dismiss the premise of this movie as utter tosh. Yes … a lot of things add up to 23 … in fact, using the right maths, probably everything adds up to 23. But, y’know, I get it, it’s not about numerology, it’s about paranoia, and the fact is, this could have been about good enough to rise above that … but in the end, it’s just one of the most excruciating pieces of nonsense I’ve ever had the misfortune to sit through. Ridiculousness piles upon ridiculousness and the film makers seem to think that we as an audience are interested enough to make our brains work through the mess of the screenplay but I for one just was not in the mood for granting such indulgence.

Jim Carrey doing serious is one of those things I think I’ve said on many occasions, “is always good.” He’s never been more serious than he is here, but I have a feeling that’s the movie’s problem on the whole. There is a little comedy here and there, I even chuckled here and there; but it’s not nearly enough to offset the overarching seriousness of the, I’ll say it again, effing ridiculous set-up.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, June 12th, 2007 at 12:58 pm and is filed under 1 heart, Movie Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.