| Man
on the Moon Starring: Jim Carrey, Jerry
"The King" Lawler
"There is no
real you," jokes Lynn Margulies (Courtney
Love) to her boyfriend, Andy Kaufman (Jim
Carrey), as he grows more contemplative during a
battle with cancer. "I forgot," he
says, playing along, though the question of
Kaufman's reality is always at issue in Milos
Forman's underappreciated Man on the Moon.
The story of
Kaufman's quick rise to fame through early
appearances on Saturday Night Live and the
conceptual stunts that made his club and concert
appearances an instant legend in the irony-fueled
1970s and early '80s, Man on the Moon
never makes the mistake of artificially
delineating Comic Andy from Private Andy. True,
we get to see something of his private interest
in meditation and some of the flakier extremes of
alternative medicine, but even these interludes
suggest the presence of an ultimate con behind
apparent miracles of transformation.
Screenwriters
Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski (The
People vs. Larry Flynt) allege that
transformation was Kaufman's purpose--more than a
shtick but less than a destiny. As we see him
constantly up the ante on the credibility of his
performance personae (the obnoxious nightclub
comic Tony Clifton; the insulting, misogynistic
professional wrestler), Forman makes it harder
and harder to detect Kaufman's sleight of hand.
But it's there, always there, always the
transcendent Andy watching the havoc he creates
and the emotions he stirs.
Carrey is
magnificent as Kaufman, re-creating uncannily
detailed comedy pieces etched in the memory of
anyone who remembers the real Andy. But while
Carrey's mimicry of Kaufman is flawless and
funny, the actor probes much deeper into an
enigmatic character who, in life, was often a
moving target even for those closest to him. --Tom
Keogh (Amazon.com)
DVD Edition
Details:
- Region 1
encoding (US and Canada only)
- Color,
Closed-captioned, DTS Stereo, Widescreen,
AC-3
- Production
notes
- Theatrical
trailer(s)
- Documentary: Andy:
The Andy Kaufman Story
- Spotlight on
Location: Behind-the-Scenes Footage and
Interviews
- Deleted
Scenes
- Music Videos
By R.E.M.: Man on the Moon
and The Great Beyond
- Special
DVD-ROM Features & Parental Lock
- Widescreen
anamorphic format
Release Date: May
30, 2000
Rating: R
Format: VHS &
DVD
Approximate
Running Time: 90 minutes
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