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Movie reviews: Yes Man

by Jon Grilz

Created on: January 08, 2009

Jim Carrey is back doing what he does best: making amusing comedies. Not side-splitting-laugh-until-you-abs-hurt comedies, but still a pretty good way to spend 90 minutes.

Carrey returns to his comedic roots in 2008s Yes Man. Carrey stars as Carl Allen, a loan officer who has become accustomed to saying no to everyone in his life, from loan applicants to his closest friends to himself.

After being convinced to go to a special seminar designed to make him a more positive person an epiphany ensues. Guru and group leader Terrence Bundley, played straight faced and very well by Terrence Stamp, confronts Carl and convinces him that he needs to start saying "yes to life".

It all sounds like a joke, not only to Carl but also the viewing audience. However, Carl says what the hell and so does the audience. It starts simply, if not difficultly when Carl starts by giving a verbose homeless man a ride to his "home" in a park. Running out of gas and having had his cell phone battery drained by the "world's most popular homeless man", Carl is forced to walk to a gas station.

While there he meets Allison played by Zoey Deschanel. A free spirited and attractive young woman that offers Carl a ride back to his car on her scooter. Throwing caution to the win, just as it seems that he has given up the idea of saying yes to anything, let alone everything, Carl suggests, under his breathe, that the two make out. Alison hesitates only a moment and plants a kiss on him, it must have been some kiss, since it changes his entire life as he begins to think that there might be something to this yes thing.

Forcing himself to say yes to even the most ridiculous proposition Carl does things he has never done before out of fear- as warned by Terrence- that breaking a promise to himself will lead to horrible consequences (i.e. falling down a flight of stairs, nearly being mauled by a guard dog, etc). Coincidences to anyone else, Carl sticks with saying yes primarily to keep the plot line going.

However, Carrey saves what would be at best a mediocre movie thanks to his classic physical comedy that he does better than anyone else in movies today. From a stumbling drunk- which is one of if not the funniest scenes in the movie- to a caffeine infused raver, Carrey's energy is infectious for the audience who are kept involved mainly out of curiosity for what will happen to Carl next.

Add in several humorous scenarios that will of course contribute later in the film, a dramatic twist involving his evolving

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