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Based on the Danny Wallace book of the same name, this has
been transformed into a Jim Carrey vehicle. When i read Wallace’s
book i thought it had great potential for a cinema translation but it
makes sense to transfer to the American market – much like the superior
adaptation of ‘High Fidelity’ – because the idea of saying ‘Yes’ to
everything asked of you, fits perfectly with the consumer minded,
capitalist culture of American self-indulgence and evangelical spirit –
JC must follow the word of this fake god (a motivational speaker played
by Terence Stamp) and in this case it is just one word. The humour is signposted; he stays up all night, gets totally wasted but his job improves and gains a girlfriend. Obviously saying yes can lead to problems, and the film goes into a dark political subtext where Carl Allen (Carrey) is painted as a terrorist because he learnt Korean and took flying lessons. It then regains its feet near the end with enough mainstream humour. And with the film definitely commercially minded follows through. There are some joys though,; Norman (Rhys Darby – from ‘Flight of the Conchords’), Carl’s boss is a whimsical sort of fellow who means well and is the original yes man who has climbed the ladder, and gets the job Carl wants. But Darby’s fish out of water character fits in nicely and is different to Carrey’s madcap lunacy. Zooey Deschanel is a gifted comedienne who does enough with the hapless role of a new girlfriend. But it does more than enough in hitting the right buttons for me to say yes to my friends.
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