Liar liar - 1997

I love the idea but I don’t like all the absurd faces he makes during this movie, so exaggerated that they make Ace Ventura look plain normal, serious even. Half the movie consists in Jim Carrey making strange faces, shouting incoherently, and generally acting weird. I know this is why the majority of people like him, and he made his fortune on this, and he’s undoubtedly good at it, I accept that, but I can’t help feeling sorry that this wasn’t a more normal comedy. Not boring serious, just without the exaggeration! When he’s not doing that, he’s so good, funny and moving, so great, and yet all the focus is on the absurd gestures - the excessive opening of the mouth when he tries to tell a lie and nothing comes out, his own arm rebelling against him when he tries to write a lie, the overplayed faces when he’s forced against his will to say the truth, when he speaks offensively to the company members and I wished there were fewer of them because the scene was so looong...
The idea is funny: Fletcher Reed is a successful lawyer who made his fortune defending bad guys by shamelessly lying to the court and who has lost his wife and is about to lose his son too because he always tells them lies and never keeps a promise. At his son Max’s birthday he doesn’t show up as usual, and the child is so sad that he makes a wish from the bottom of his heart: that his father won’t be able to tell a lie for a whole day. From that moment Fletcher finds himself telling the truth against his will: he loses his secretary, risks losing his job, makes a fool of himself in court, all before midday. When he finds out about his son’s wish, he tries to make him undo what he did but it doesn’t work because deep down the kid doesn’t want him to lie. Fletcher has no choice but going to court anyway in the afternoon. A lot of faces and screams and beating himself up in the bathroom later, he finds a way to win the case without lying. It’s a divorce case, and the woman lied about her age to be able to get married, she was really seventeen so her prenuptial agreement is invalid. He’s relieved and satisfied until the woman gets greedy and decide to fight for full custody of the two children to get more money. Sad thing is, she didn’t want it the day before but then he filled her head with stupid lies about her husband being the guilty part there. We will never know the fate of those children.
Fletcher feels really bad about it because the husband is a good father - everything Fletcher is not - and the children love him. He yells how not fair all that is, and he’s hold in contempt but luckily his old secretary bails him out, so he can run to the airport where his wife and son are about to leave to stay with Jerry who asked her to marry him and move with him. 
A big scene at the airport where he stops the plane and talks to his son, and his wife decide they won’t move away after all, so the child can stay near his father - okay, but if Fletcher is fired or otherwise leave this firm to maybe open his own, couldn’t he do it in Boston? Well, that wouldn’t work with the obvious happy ending where mum and dad get back together.. :-/
Fletcher-Jim Carrey
his wife Audrey-Maura Tierney
Max-Justin Cooper
Jerry-Cary Elwes
Greta-Anne Haney - loved her.
ITA bugiardo bugiardo