May 23, 2001 01:37 AM
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The Farrelly brothers announce their sympathies in Me, Myself & Irene by making its first two villians-the hero's fickle wife and the dwarf she leaves him for-members of Mensa. Theirs is a comedy pitched straight at your inner (or outer) idiot.
But stupid isn't always funny. It's usually funny only if smartly done. And so this Jim Carrey vehicle manages to be both funny and pervasively, teeth-gnashingly moronic. Carrey gives a maniacal, plastic faced and rubber limbed performance as Charlie, a nice guy highway patrolman with a sociopathic alter-ego named Hank; both halves fall for the cute on the run Irene. Along with a handful of sight gags, Carrey is about the only reason to see this movie, in which the hearts and minds of Dumb & Dumber seek new comedic purposes for various bodily fluids, functions and orifices.
THe funny thing is, Bobby & Peter Farrelly last year made a fairly smart dumb comedy, There's Something About Mary, which compared to Irene is a model of farcical construction. When it make any sense at all, Irene's story is sketchy, the scenes and characters poorly developed. The script sets up a sweet, winning inversion-Charlie lovingly raises the three heavyweight African-American lads sired by his ex-wife's boyfriend-then squanders it by making the triplets one-note jokes who can't complete a sentence without saying an obscenity. Actually, there are two notes: Taking after their mother and father, the boys are smart, too. Yet Farrelly certainty to portray young black men as unusually intelligent is perhaps the film's most truly offensive aspect.
Jim Carrey can put the funny back in stupid by being smart. Yet this movie doesn't do it.
