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Review: Man On The Moon
From Larry Flint to Andy Kaufman, director Milos Forman has become a chronicler of one of America's most distinct cultural species - the sometimes brilliant, offensive, self-destructive celebrity eccentric. What makes people like Flynt and Kaufman so American is that few societies would tolerate them at all, let alone elevate them to star status.
"Man In The Moon" may turn out to be the best movie of the holiday season. Jim Carrey's portrayal of the tormented Kaufman is the best performance by an actor in months.
Carrey's performance also highlights the one glaring flaw in any Kaufman story. The movie is bigger than its subject. Carrey looms much larger than Kaufman did. Kaufman, who performed on Saturday Night Live, then more successfully as the goofball "Latke" on the ABC sitcom "Taxi," was one of the most self-destructive figures in modern entertainment. And his fame was fleeting.
Although he could be brilliantly funny, he became obsessed with pushing the boundaries of what the public would accept, between parody and reality. He taunted women, working-class whites, and Southerners in particular, constantly challenging his audience to figure out what was a joke and what wasn't. Eventually, they stopped caring.
The producers of Saturday Night Live asked the audience to call in and vote on whether or not the increasingly controversial Kaufman should remain on the show. They overwhelmingly voted to kick him out, a stinging rebuke for viewers on a program that at the time reveled in pushing boundaries.
Carrey is wonderful at playing Kaufman, even as he perhaps inadvertently shows how much more grounded and talented he is as an actor and comedian. Danny DeVito is also first-rate as Kaufman's long suffering manager/agent George Shapiro.
Questions of free speech and public offense have always swirled around media and entertainment. This is the birthplace not only of the First Amendment but of the most elaborate ratings and blocking systems in the free world. Americans can never quite seem to figure out whether they really want freedom, or just love invoking the idea of it. Provocateurs like Hustler Magazine's Flynt and entertainers like the late Lenny Bruce and Kaufman are constantly forcing the issue.
Kaufman was a mess, even by contemporary celebrity standards. He bitterly resented his label as a comedian, viewing himself as a more sophisticated performance artist. Although he was wildly popular on "Taxi" as the odd-sounding "Latke," he despised commercial television and especially that particular role, even though it was making him rich and famous. Sometimes, he even walked offstage during live performances if audiences pressured him to play his TV character. This struggle of a performer to practice his art on his own terms is beautifully rendered by Carrey.
Kaufman flirted with various meditative and holistic groups and practices, none of which did him any good when he was diagnosed as having a fatal form of lung cancer.
What makes Carrey's acting so impressive is that Kaufman was not especially likeable, and so erratic and unpredictable as to be nearly incomprehensible. His crusade to make audiences think was in some ways admirable, but also arrogant, especially after it became increasingly clear that what his audiences wanted was just to laugh. One of the most effective things about this movie is that it makes you root for the audience as well as the performer. Comedy after all, is about escaping reality, not creating additional work.
Even though Carrey towers over Kaufman, in the movie and in life, "Man In The Moon" is a powerful, haunting look into America's celebrity culture.
If you want to jump in, please feel free:
i have to say this, because i really think andy kaufman was great and i think jon katz got a lot of things wrong.
first, throw out the free speech bit. that has little if anything to do with the story.
second, however big the subject was isn't really important. the story was touching, unique, and hilarious. who cares how popular or unpopular andy was? it really doesn't matter.
now then, i don't think it's fair to say kaufman was a mess. why does jon think this? because he didn't care so much about the money when he did "Taxi?" because he despised sitcoms? i don't quite see jon's point
it was a good movie. as i stated before, andy's story was quite unique, very touching, and altogether hilarious, so it was quite enjoyable to watch jim carrey (who played the part very well, i thought) recreate it. i will agree to an extent with a previous poster who said he'd rather have watched more real footage of andy, and in fact there is an andy kaufman special that airs every now and then on comedy central which is really a documentary of much of his life. i don't think carrey brought any of his traditional "stupid humor" to the movie though--after having watched the cc special i think he did a really good job of portraying kaufman. most of the time it really felt like i was watching andy and i didn't even think about the fact that it was jim carrey. all things considered, it was a good movie. go see it.
The SNL vote deal was much more sinister than the movie portrays. Andy and director Dick Ebersol had agreed Andy would be voted out, but Tony Clifton would still come on. Ebersol and Lorne Michaels just didn't think Clifton would do well, chastising the audience, on national TV. But Andy wanted him on bad enough, he went through with the deal. And as Andy could do, he ensured enough people voted "No."
Unlike the movie's 20some% voting for him, it was closer, 53% to 47%. And when the tally came in, Ebersol turned on the "deal" and told Andy he (or Clifton, or any persona) would never be on the show. Naturally, he was hurt. And this was just another hit in his downward spiral. It's amazing how many things went bad in those few months, his mother having a stroke, finding he had three months to live, getting betrayed by his favorite TV show, Taxi was cancelled, pro wrestling was over, and the TM powers that be told him he could no longer come to the retreats.
Pick up the "Andy Kaufman Revealed" book by Bob Zmuda, it's worth the read.
Besides, from the trailers I've seen, Carrey has Andy Kaufman down *perfectly*, right down to that demonic gleam he always had in his eye. I somehow seriously doubt that the script involves Carrey talking via his ass. Anyhow, he was pretty good in the Truman Show (which was, at least, an original movie).
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Every year during my review, I just pray the words "slashdot.org" aren't mentioned.
If you look at the previews and go "hey cool, I think i'd like to see that", then go see it, you'll be very pleased by it. if you look at the previews and you think you'll hate it, then you probably will... so DON'T GO.. if you're not sure, then ask a friend who did see it.. I took my girlfriend who had never heard of andy kaufman, and she thought it was very funny, and she even cried at the end (of course, she cries when she burns a piece of chicken.. so i donno what that says). I thought the movie was hilarious.. in fact it was the first movie I went to in a long time wher I actually laughed _out loud_ during the film. so did at least half the audience. and if you hate jim carrey, I'd still see it. Jim is nothing like his normal characters. I am not a huge fan of the mask, and dumb and dumber, and the many others he's done.. but I thought this was a great movie.
-- "I feel a strong disturbance in the for.."\*Segmentation Fault*\ (core dumped)
I liked the movie. It was well done, and Carrey did a good job. The soundtrack was also excellant (REM always is. :^})
I found that Katz' review meandered towards his usual tact -- about half way through the ''movie review'' he goes off on this tirade about Americans and their view of freedom. (Or at least his idea of what they think of it. )
He attempts to get back on track with the review, but he never seems to. Instead he veers off into the related area of Kaufman's (and Carrey's as well) acting career.
When looking for a movie review, I want to see soemthing that reviews the movie, not the background of the actors. But that's my opinion, YMMV. :-)
Overall, I score this review a 7. Not horrible, but not great either.
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http://gabrielcain.com/
Excellent point! Andy Kaufman wasn't so much doing comedy as he was prying it apart, to see what makes it tick. Then he showed you what was inside it. The comparison to writers like Barth is very insightful... the average fiction reader couldn't handle genius work, either. How many of you have read James Joyce' "Ulysses"?
That gets back to what i said in my review... Andy Kaufman didn't so much make you laugh as make you squirm.
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Hand me that airplane glue and I'll tell you another story.
(I originally posted this review yesterday to a small discussion mailing list i share with a few friends)
Man on the Moon
starring Jim Carrey, Danny Devito, Courtney Love, et al
directed by Milos Forman
produced by Danny Devito
"Man on the Moon" is the story of the rise, fall, and death of legendary
comic Andy Kaufman. Some of you may know Kaufman from his role as the
zany eastern European mechanic on the sitcom "Taxi". Others may know
him for his occasional work on Saturday Night Live, and the story of how
the audience voted to not have him on the show anymore. Or maybe you've
never heard of him at all. Those who have watched his work generally
either love him or hate him. He didn't like neutral reactions, and
didn't get them.
Author bias here: i think Andy Kaufman was one of the greatest geniuses
in comic history. And yes, he fell on his face a lot, and went over the
top A LOT. But when he was on, he was golden. Lots of comedians make
you laugh. Some make you think. Andy Kaufman made you squirm. Of
course, most people don't want to squirm, don't want to find humor in
their own embarassment and shame, so a lot of people hated him.
That being said, i loved this movie. It may not be one of the greatest
films ever made, but it really works well, and tells a fascinating
story. I think it's worth seeing even if you didn't like Andy Kaufman.
What i liked most about it, i think, wasn't so much the story, but
rather getting to see all the great Andy Kaufman standup shows and
routines that were never captured on film. His work on Taxi and
Saturday Night Live barely scratched the surface. In the film, you get
the full story of his pro wrestling career, his famous Carnegie Hall
show when he took the entire audience out for milk and cookies, the
story of Tony Clifton, etc. This is hardcore genius work. And, like
much genius work, it is often difficult to understand (at one point, his
manager (Danny Devito) chides him and his writer Bob Zmuda (Paul
Giamatti) for dragging out the Tony Clifton joke to where it was only
funny to two people in the entire world... but of course, those two
thought it was hilarious).
The acting is generally superb. For me, Jim Carrey never completely
became Kaufman, but that's probably because i had seen the real Kaufman
so much. But i have to credit Carrey with getting his timing and
mannerisms down as well as any actor is capable of doing them... and for
Kaufman, comedy was as much a matter of timing as anything. The
Maharishi Mahesh Yogi once told him the secret of being funny was
"Silence", and he used silence more effectively than any comedian since
Buster Keaton (personally, i say the essence of comedy is timing, but i
suspect the Maharishi and i mean the same thing). So, despite the fact
that i couldn't overcome the cognitive dissonance of Carrey playing
Kaufman, it worked as well as such things ever do for me.
Danny Devito plays Kaufman's manager George Shapiro (the film was his
baby... he worked with Kaufman on Taxi, and then produced it as an ode
to his friend). As George Shapiro, Devito provides the primary lens
through which the audience sees Andy Kaufman. Fans of Milos Forman's
previous work (Amadeus, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest) will recognize
the technique of humanizing a genius character for the audience by
watching him through more ordinary eyes. As usual, Devito completely
absorbs his role, becoming the most believable character in the film.
Paul Giamatti as Kaufman's writer/partner Bob Zmuda, and Courtney Love
as Kaufman's girlfriend, both deliver superbly given their somewhat
limited roles. Courtney Love in particular doesn't get enough meat in
her part to be much more than a mirror, but what she does she does very
well. For someone like her who specializes in being over the top, she
is very subdued and sensitive in the role.
Perhaps the best thing i can say about this film is that i intend to buy
a copy when it is available on video - for my children. Not for
today... although there isn't anything in it that i don't think they
should see (brief nudity? so?), it's very much adult humor, in that it
is humor about how adults see the world. Andy Kaufman's humor, while
childlike and evoking childhood memories, is not something children can
even understand as humor. What's funny to adults is just normal for
them. But, when they're old enough to understand, i want them to see
this film. It's a matter of cultural education, getting a chance to see
one of the greatest comedians ever in action. It's the same reason i'd
get them a Buster Keaton movie, really.
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120
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Hand me that airplane glue and I'll tell you another story.
I think the big problem is that Jim Carrey got 'big' with "Ace Ventura" and "The Mask", and for awhile he was typcast in created "Jim Carrey zannyness" vehicles.
I think that I's only been since "Liar, Liar" that he's been able to show any more serious talent...
jf
Hmm, well, Katz's job description is "media critic", which encompasses "movie critic", so if as you say he's not much cop at that... well, maybe it's just his hobby, and he hacks some mean perl code for a living. In which case, don't be too hard on the guy, OK?
"even though Jim Carrey is already much more of a comedic legend than Andy Kaufman, the man he portrays. "
Jon, please follow up on this... What do you base this on?
Money?
Hollywood Acting Rolls?
Did you see someone on the E! channel say this?
People Magazine?
First, it would seem that any popular dead icon will be elivated to "legend", but Kaufman was an innovator. Carrey has emulated a lot of Kaufman's and Jerry Lewis' comedic tactics. Carrey is great, but he is appealing to his audiance. Kaufman was challenging. As it is with all of the greatest artists, it is those that break barriers, challenge the status quo and piss people with their work that will be remembered for their art.
Happy New Year!
James F. Bickford
Sys Dev Assistant
Electronic Interface Support
pronoblem
Bob Zmuda's book on Kaufman (Andy Kaufman Revealed!: Best Friend Tells All) is brilliant. While i haven't yet seen the film (and i am looking forward to it), the book goes into detail about the fact that Kaufman's most astonishing performances were performed for people who didn't know they were watching one. Things he did in restaurants, on the street. It's a great book, very funny. His point was that he didn't have to be funny, just interesting.
And it's hardly fair to say that Andy flirted with meditation; he was a dedicated TM'er for his entire adult life, meditating every day.
Of course, i'd be remiss not to mention Andy Lives.
mahlen
A jury consists of twelve persons chosen to decide who has the better lawyer.
--Robert Frost
After seeing the movie, I only have one question on my mind: Was Jerry Lawler really in on the wrestling thing?
Before the movie, I had never heard that he was in on the whole idea. However, we know that the movie as semi-biographical and that the producers may have had to accept a revised history to get Lawler on the show.
Lawler was in on itIf Lawler was in on it, why would he give the joke away in the movie? Wouldn't it be better to keep it a secret and keep it larger than life?
Lawler wasn't in on itIf Lawler wasn't in on it, then this was his chance to make it appear like he was. In hindsight, he would have realized that he simply became a prop for Andy. With Andy dead, Lawler can throw in the final "punch."
Does anyone out there know what really happened?
Know what I like about atheists? I've yet to meet one that believes God is on their side.
This is one of the major reasons I liked the movie -- precisely because he wasn't his typical dumb, plastic self. This wasn't one of the "Jim Carrey starring as Jim Carrey!" roles. I don't like him either, never seen any of his movies, short of his role in whichever one of the Batman flicks he was in.
Before this movie came out, I'd heard stories about how after a filming session and then for a few weeks after the movie was completed, he actually had to regain his own personality back, because he'd absorbed the role of Kaufman to such a great degree. Indeed, he certainly did a great job.
hmm, I knew this was going to show up.
In addition to seeing enough of his antics in various minor guest appearances on shows, TV commercials, etc....He was on "In Living Color" before he was ever in the movies...
Where do you get off calling this piece, a 'review' of "Man On The Moon"? You've said NOTHING about the movie, except that it stars Jim Carey and Danny DeVito, and is about Andy Kaufman. ANYONE who has seen an advert for the film already knows that.
Instead, you should have called your article "The Jon Katz Opinion of Andy Kaufman". And even as that, it wasn't a very good, or well thought out, one.
Jon, if you haven't got anything to say, don't say anything. If you must spew, at least give your rant a suitable headline. Some journalist you're turning out to be.
-- What you do today will cost you a day of your life.
I'm not sure that he ever actually finished the reading, but he read at least several chapters at some shows.
Something else in the same vein that he used to do was to sing the entire "99 Bottles of Beer on the Wall" song for the audience.
Cheers,
ZicoKnows@hotmail.com
Does pushing the limits make one a great human being? Seems that's about all Kaufman did. That he may have been trying to be funny is immaterial. He was offensive but not particularly funny.
All comics try to be funny. Some comics push the limits of what is acceptable. Some manage to do both. I know it's just my opinion (well not just mine, as lots of SNL viewers apparently felt the same way), but Kaufman did not do both. He was just not very funny.
Let me start out by saying that I respect Jon Katz. I disagree with him a lot, but he is out there saying what is on his mind and standing up for that in which he believes. That said, I find it hard to believe that the man who claims to be in harmony with the outcast geek can manage to so totally misunderstand Andy Kaufman.
With all due respect to Jim Carrey, he hasn't a fraction of Kaufman's talent. Katz makes the capital mistake of equating popularity with talent. This is rank hypocrisy from the man who defends the unpopular geek. Apparently that's easy when you're posting on a web site dedicated to the interests of nerds and geeks. It makes him popular here.
Milos Forman has, it seems to me, been exploring what it means to be a rebel. From Amadeus through The People vs. Larry Flynt he seems to be looking for the stories of people who are standing proudly and self-conciously outside the current of their times.
Andy Kaufman is held in awe by comics. This awe is not given him because of his success, but because of his daring. Not because he was always successful, but because he didn't merely make new material, he kept exploding the boundaries of what comedy is.
In a world where you can't tell one comic's airline jokes from another comic's rush hour traffic jokes from yet another comic's relationship jokes, Kaufman kept walking on to the stage and doing material that most comics wouldn't dare to imagine, let alone perform.
Practicing comics know that there is the safe way, which will keep you comfortably nestled in the audience's love, getting easy laughs from the amusing foibles of suburban middle-class life, and then there is the dangerous way where you cut through the assumptions, you pierce our neat ideas of order, you diassemble the human condition and make see ourselves anew. This is what great art in all its manifestations does for us. Sometimes it makes us uncomfortable and afraid.
Most comics are hungry for the laugh, for the audience to like them and to think they are clever. I've dome some stand-up in my time and I must admit that I fall firmly in this category. What Andy Kaufman did may not have always succeeded, but it was done for some other reason. Some deeper reason than winning mere praise. He was driven to find some deeper knowledge of that place in us where laughter comes from.
Now, I would not claim to know Jim Carrey's inner heart, but from watching his work over the years, I would say that he, like many comics of greater or lesser talent, works for the laugh, works for the love. He also, like many others, knows that that is a rather shallow use of the attention given the stage. I think he leapt at the chance to play Kaufman because it was an opportunity to move beyond the self-gratification and to do it from the safety of playing someone else.
I have done both stand-up and stage acting (only semi-professionally, mind, I'm not "somebody.") and they are quite different. Being trapped in a written character actually liberates your behavior. Your free display of emotion is okay because it isn't you. It's the character; it's the writer.
When you do stand-up, it is you, naked and alone before that hungry thing we call an audience. That's why most of us fall into the safe stuff. Andy Kaufman did something much riskier and much more dangerous. He didn't make laughs, he made art.
Love the outsider.
This is just the most slanted, misguided quote ever:
"Man In The Moon" may be the best holiday movie of the year so far, even though Jim Carrey is already much more of a comedic legend than Andy Kaufman, the man he portrays.
Jim Carrey has made more movies and more $$ but he is by no *NO* means more of a comedic legend than Andy Kaufman. Andy was a genius that will be remembered for generations to come, like Charlie Chaplin. Jim Carrey will be quickly forgotten as an icon of a very stupid age in media, gone the way of the Tony Danza's of this world.
At the time of Kaufman's heyday, sure, everyone had an agent, but there wasn't as much competition for the buck as we have today, 15-20 years later. We want to be entertained, and we want to laugh, and we want to see someone push the limits, as long as it's entertaining. Today we have cable TV, high-spaz network TV, the Internet, and Jon Katz.
Maybe this was true in Kaufman's day, too, but Carrey has successfully made Kaufman an entertainer, and in those moments where Kaufman is portrayed as the entertainer that went too far, Carey becomes a performance genius. This was true for Kaufman, too: this was why his "Taxi" character and lunge lizard characters were so popular: had these characters been the Real Andy, he would have been remembered as an idiot - and no man behind that idiot.
There is no better "proof" of this than the SNL phone-in, where viewers decided that they didn't like Andy's art form, and opted not to see it anymore on late-night television. I suppose I can credit Andy for staying true to his form and not sell out to what the masses wanted him to become; but truth of the matter is, we didn't like Andy - and yet, he's regarded today as a legend.
Someone please answer me this question: is it true that Andy didn't recover from his lung disease because everyone close to him thought he was just performing again (and by the time they realized he was serious, it was too late)?
"He who questions training trains himself at asking questions." - The Sphinx, Mystery Men (1999)
Jonathan please listen. Andy Kaufman is a comedic genius. We still cannot even today understand the levels his mind worked at. Please do not disgrace his legend and memory by saying that Jim Carey of all people even compares to him.
"...even though Jim Carrey is already much more of a comedic legend than Andy Kaufman, the man he portrays..."
How much do you want to bet that there will never be a movie about Jim Carrey's life?
Nuts. "The Cable Guy" was definitely risky -- it
failed, and the movie blew chunks, but it was definitely a gutsy move on Carrey's part. "The Truman Show" had many problems, foremost the cop-out ending, but Carrey's performace was strong there. "The Mask," of course, played directly into his talents and he shone there (and it remains Cameron Diaz' best flick barring "My Best Friend's Wedding" -- the woman cannot pull off lead roles to save her life).
Kaufman gloried in deliberate obscurantism, and committed the one unpardonable sin: deliberately boring the audience. He's an interesting biographical study, if only because he was so fucked in the head, but really -- Carrey's more entertaining.
gomi
I know I'm rambling, but you have to see the fact that Kaufman's act was _so_ much more than what you see on the surface. He was constantly experimenting, and he was different. It was his difference, not his act, that people chose to hate, as many do when faced with something they do not know and are not willing to look into.
I had a point, but I have no idea if I hit it... sorry to have taken up your time.
----- this is my sig, do you like it?
I'm not sure how being on the cover of Time equals being "ignored by the media." Truman Show was hyped through the roof, if you'll recall, and while I thought it was pretty good, Carrey's acting honestly just proved that he didn't have to be Ace Ventura all the time. He didn't really do much special other than that. Man on the Moon, IMHO, is the first time that Carrey has actually proven that he can actually act, and therefore it's the first movie that he actually deserves an Oscar nomination for.
-jacob
I have long been an Andy Kaufman fan. Maybe one of the reasons for this is that I came upon him after the fact. Probably not too many Slashdotters actually remember Andy Kaufman, and went through what he put his audiences through.
I am not sure if I would have liked him so much back in the late 70's or early 80's... but I like to think I would have.
I think Katz is off by even trying to compare Jim Carey to Andy Kaufman, saying that Carey is already bigger than Kaufman. Of course he is... Jim Carey is by all means a conventional comedian (I happen to love him though), he has in no ways pushed or challenged conventional methods or barriers or brought any new aspects to comedy or acting. Kaufman did. I tend to agree with Kaufman's view that he was more of a performing artist than a comedian. Just like any succesful artist (of any medium), he painted emotions... and I can scarce come up with anyone else who could so succesfully bring out such a wide range of emotions out of an audience.
We know how many comedians have been influenced by Andy Kaufman and consider him a genius... how many future ones will think the same thing of Jim Carey (and consider him a genius)? So by no means is Jim Carey bigger than Andy Kaufman... at least in my book.
Why not default all replies to Katz articles to (-1, Flamebait) to save moderators their precious points? The number of moderator points that have been wasted trying to keep people who browse at 1 or higher from noticing that half of the people who post on /. hate Katz must be staggering.
-=Best Viewed Using [INLINE]=-
What it boils down to is this: much as Barth writes meta-fiction (that is, fiction that is not just about the story's characters, but also about itself as a work of fiction, an artifical experience written on a page) Kaufman (sp?) was a meta-comedian. His act wasn't just about being funny, but examining how things are funny and how we find them to be funny. In this sense, yes, the man was certainly an artists. But, that by no means is to say that he was especially aesthetically appealing or all that much of a blast.
Again, just the opinion of one guy who isn't a comedian.
Much Love,
"S"HM
*****
(I refuse to spellcheck out of contempt for your belief system)
isn't this movie entitled "Man _on_ the moon"?
> I think Jim Carrey is perhaps one of the most
> over hyped "actors" of the nineties. Not only is
> he a BAD actor, but he is not very funny.
Well I have to agree that he is WAY over-hyped.
However, I can't say that he is a bad actor.
So far it seems that in every movie I have seen
him in, he basically plays the same character.
All of them have basically been wild comedies
of one sort or another that feature his brand
of humor.
Basically, the roles he has been in so far have
been way too shallow to gauge any sort of acting
ability. Put Cary in a lead role in Hamlet and
see him act, then I will tell you if he is a bad
actor or not.
I have yet to see this Man On the Moon movie,
I have a feeling this role may be the first one
of his that is deep enough to truely get an idea
of his abilities. (deep enough in that Andy
Kaufman had a completely differnt personality than
Cary does) .
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
Or at least, he never saw himself as such. He considered himself a performer - more than he wanted to push boundaries, he really wanted to perform. Even in his big comic successes like the Carnegie Hall show, he wasn't trying to be funny during probably 90% of the stuff the audience was laughing at. He was there to perform - to entertain - the same way he had been entertained by TV shows like Howdy Doody etc. when he was a child. Was he funny? Absolutely, but not exclusively.
I find it humorous that Katz would make a statement such as this. In fact, I found nearly *everything* Katz said in his "review" humorous.
Allow me to explain. Judging from Katz's comments of Kaufman, it would seem that he has fallen into the same trap that Kaufman critics have been falling into for years...and would also lead me to believe that he didn't *really* pay that close attention to the film (Man *IN* the Moon???)
"...he became obsessed with pushing the boundaries..."
Became? It would appear to me (after having actually watched the film) that Andy was obsessed with pushing the boundaries of what people would accept way back when he was a child, performing to the wall.
"He taunted women, working-class whites, and Southerners in particular, constantly challenging his audience to figure out what was a joke and what wasn't."
Hmmm...doesn't really sound *any* different than what any of the scripted bad guys say and do on every episode of WWF RAW. Yet you don't hear Katz whining about any of those guys. In fact, I found Kaufman very reminiscent of the modern professional wrestlers...if not the predecessor.
Katz doesn't seem to be able to differentiate between one of Kaufman's characters (in this case his wrestling persona) and that of the "real andy kaufman."
"They overwhelmingly voted to kick him out..."
Poor Katz. Kaufman was only "overwhelmingly kicked out" in the movie. In real life, the vote was much closer. Andy lost 195,544 to 169,186.
"Although he was wildly popular on 'Taxi' as the odd-sounding 'Latke...'"
Uh...its LATKA!
"Kaufman flirted with various meditative and holistic groups and practices, none of which did him any good when he was diagnosed as having a fatal form of lung cancer. "
This sentence irritated me more than the rest of Katz's "review" did.
Flirted? Kaufman was incredibly serious about his transcendental practices...even the movie was clear in showing how hurt Kaufman was when he was asked to leave the group.
None of his practices did him any good? Maybe it was because by the time his cancer was detected it was incurable and, in fact, not even modern medicine was of any use to Andy.
Mr. Katz, its one thing to attack a movie or a character in a movie, its another thing entirely to attack the personal choices of Kaufman.
As I alluded to earlier, its almost as if Katz didn't even pay attention (or watch it at all...)
He could have told us specifically why the movie was one of the best of the year, but instead he merely tells us generic examples of how he believes Carrey to be better than Kaufman.
That said, I still don't see how watching a movie gives Katz poetic license (or any license whatsoever) to criticize the real Kaufman's religious/spiritual choices.
Very low ball...even for JK.
Come on, Tinkler, Tink!!
The review was not making a comparison between Larry Flint and Andy Kaufman. It was referring to the fact that the director, Milos Forman, has made movies about both of them, and they are/were both people surrounded by controversy.
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One thing about this movie that impressed me and made me want to see it was the way it was made. Jim Carrey was devoted to making this movie as real as possible. While on the set of the movie Carrey was always in character. He was never himself. He was always trying to stay in the mood that made Andy act the way he did.
Also, when the movie was being made it was rumored that Jim Carrey had suffered an actual neck injury at the hand of Jerry Lawler, the wrestler who supposedly broke Kaufman's neck in real life. This rumor was the kind of thing that Kaufman lived for. He wanted people to wonder when he was telling the truth and when he was playing a role.
In conlusion, I think that even if you weren't a fan of Kaufman, but were aware of the kind of person he was, you would enjoy this movie. Jim Carrey did an excellent job in the role and I think that his performance alone merits seeing this movie.
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