ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Saturday, June 15, 1996 TAG: 9606180014
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: B-10 EDITION: METRO
TYPE: MOVIE REVIEW
SOURCE: MIKE MAYO CORRESPONDENT
About half of "The Cable Guy" is a stinging comic attack on television and our national preoccupation with it. Another half is based on star Jim Carrey's physical and verbal humor. Neither is meant for kids.
When the two halves overlap, the film is sporadically funny with dark, unpleasant undercurrents. For long stretches of time, though - most obviously during the slow beginning - the two halves have nothing to do with each other, and then the story becomes a strange romance. Or is it a horror tale?
Steven (Matthew Broderick) is a hard-driving young executive whose girlfriend, Robin (Leslie Mann), has just kicked him out of her apartment. He asked her to marry him; she needs more space. So he moves into a new place and calls the cable company.
The title character (Carrey) turns out to be a lonely guy who decides that he wants to be Steven's friend. The problem is that Chip, as he calls himself, is one of those insecure guys who takes everything too far. At other times, though, he is not so much a realistic character as the embodiment a life spent in front of the tube. (For anyone who hasn't watched that much network television, many of the references are meaningless.)
When Lou Holtz Jr.'s script is following the rocky progress of the Steven-Chip-Robin triangle, it's largely ineffective. The other characters never really connect with Carrey's wild mugging and writhing. It's almost as if he's acting in a vacuum. Weirdly violent scenes on a basketball court and in a restaurant men's room could have come from another movie.
The more openly satirical side has to do with a Simpsonesque trial that everyone is following on Court TV. Those short bits feature director Ben Stiller as two celebrity twins, one who killed the other. They're really more successful - and much funnier - than the other half. But, again, they're so distinctly separate from the rest of the action that they never amount to much.
Longer scenes involving a medieval restaurant, a geriatric karaoke party and a dirty word game are more fully developed, but they're not particularly funny. While Carrey's version of the old Jefferson Airplane hit "Somebody to Love" earns full credit for weirdness, it doesn't come close to his best moments in either "Ace Ventura" movie.
In his first film, "Reality Bites," director Stiller showed that he can create good characters, dialogue and human relationships. But none of those are too important in a Jim Carrey comedy. In fact, they just get in the way.
Carrey's fans want to see him go too far with talking butts, the wild makeup effects of "The Mask" or the manic capers of The Riddler in "Batman Forever." Are they ready for his version of Freddy Krueger with a satellite dish and a speech impediment?
A more experienced comic director might have been able to mold the material to fit the star's particular talents, but that seems unlikely. "The Cable Guy" is simply an example of bad chemistry.
The Cable Guy HH1/2
A Columbia Pictures release playing at the Salem Valley 8 and Valley View 6. 91 minutes. Rated PG-13 for subject matter, violence, strong language.
LENGTH: Medium: 67 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: Jim Carrey plays Chip, the title character in ``Theby CNBCable Guy.'' color.