Director: Tom Shadyac
Starring: Jim Carrey, Justin Cooper, Maura Tierney, Cary Elwes
Year: 1997
It would be hard to explain now how impactful Jim Carrey was in the 90s, and just how large he loomed on the screen. Ace Ventura, The Mask, Dumb and Dumber, Batman Forever, The Cable Guy, Liar Liar, The Truman Show, Man on the Moon; the guy was everywhere, and we always flocked to see him. Sometimes, looking back, his films/characters hold up (Truman Show) and sometimes they don’t (Ace Ventura), but Liar Liar is an interesting case because it’s at the same time wildly inappropriate and hilariously funny, trading off between good and bad until you don’t know quite what to think anymore.
Fletcher Reede is a terrible father. He means well, he used to be attentive, he used to love his son’s mother, but, since the divorce, Fletcher has become increasingly obsessed with success, saying & doing anything to win his cases in the courtroom, and leaving everyone around him waiting on his hollow promises. Well, little Max has had enough, and for his 5th birthday (which Fletcher said he would be there for, but once again he wasn’t telling the truth) he wished that his dad couldn’t lie, just even for one full day, and when the wish comes true the consequences are ridiculous.
I was surprised, watching it after all these years, by just how adult this movie is. It is NOT for kids, and that makes sense, it’s PG-13, but I remember everyone in school watching it, cause that’s just what we did, and it’s not at all appropriate. The jokes are even more cringey now, and there are solid chunks of this film that are super hard to watch. Then Jim Carrey steps up, uses physical comedy in the way only he can, and you’re left rolling on the floor. That’s the up & down of this movie, it’s all over the place, perfectly funny and then just mind-blowingly wrong. I guess that’s a problem with revisiting the 90s; it wasn’t all great, but man was it fun.
My rating: ★ ★ ★ ☆ ☆