Memória Curta

After an explosion, private detective Maurice Pogue wakes up every morning with amnesia. The night before, he has always made sure to record on tape everything he would need to remember the next day, such as what is wrong with him and why. One very important detail: he must not tell anyone what is wrong with him, because he must testify in the case against Cornell, the bad guy responsible for the explosion, and without his testimony there is no case. Obviously, if he can't remember the explosion, he has no credibility as a witness.

Sarah Novak, who was supposedly killed in the explosion, comes to Pogue for help, saying she can't go to the police. She may be in the Witness Protection Program as fashion model Beth Holly. Or perhaps Beth is pretending to be Sarah.

Pogue and Sarah/Beth must search for a coin worth millions. One gag involves this coin being put into a parking meter.

And Pogue is also the father of a baby. It would be a disaster if a baby was put in the care of someone in his situation.

Cornell would like Pogue to conveniently forget what he saw. Of course, he doesn't know that he has gotten his wish.

Rosenheim is the prosecutor in Cornell's case, but he is so dense that when given clues the blind street musician could see the significance of, he can't figure out what they mean. Dolby is Rosenheim's wheelchair-bound boss.

Speaking of the street musician, he is quite good. He plays the clarinet and people give him money. Next to him is an artist painting new versions of The Mona Lisa on the side of a building. I say "versions" because he is not good at accepting criticism.

I liked a lot of the music in this movie. Some of it was traditional jazz, and the movie used various styles of music from old-style detective movies.

The concept of a private detective with amnesia was the funniest thing. Pogue had to be a detective every morning just to figure out who he was. "Groundhog Day" in reverse.

Dana Carvey was okay as Pogue. He had several standout moments, such as the time Cornell came to his door just after Pogue reminded himself the landlord was demanding the rent or else! And there was the scene where, while watching an old detective movie (Bogart may have been in it, but I'm not entirely sure), Pogue figured out how to solve his problem. And of course Dolby's birthday party at the movie's start.

I thought Michael Gambon gave the best performance as the evil gangster Cornell. Not completely evil, but balanced and convincing.

Pogue's dog Baby (played by Barkley) added a lot, because he kept bumping into things because of his lack of depth perception. And of course the name means Pogue keeps searching for clues related to a baby.

It isn't great, but it is entertaining.

Since it didn't affect the overall storyline, I'm rating it decently, though not as high as a 7 because of it. If the dog's blind in one eye, he would have a depth perception problem, not a problem of seeing an object off to the side of where it actually is. Other than that, I really like this one.

Dana Carvey is an excellent comedian, and this movie makes good use of his many talents. "Clean Slate" is a situation comedy with a decent setup, but what makes the movie is Dana's interpretation of the confused guy who has to untangle a mess he doesn't know anything about. His facial expressions are hilarious, and his delivery perfect. This is one of my favorite movies. The movie it best compares to is "So I married an axe murderer" in the sense that it follows a funny guy and a fox as they try to untangle themselves from a series of embarrassing situations, all the while trying to solve the underlying mystery.

Okay, But Not Memorable (Pun Intended) I didn't find this as humorous as I had hoped to find after Carvey's hit "Wayne World" farces. The high, in a dark humor-ish vein, was the dog in the film. The mutt who had a depth perception problem and kept running into things, was easily the best character in the movie.

The premise was fine: a private detective (Dana Carvey playing "Maurice Pogue") with short term memory loss, meaning the following day he keeps forgetting what happened the previous 24 hours. Add a femme fatale and some wild gangsters, and this film should have been hilarious....but it wasn't. The running gags with Pogue faking things all the time because of the memory problems is what became annoying.

Part of the problem might have been casting. Carvey looks like anything but a hard-boiled detective. Also, although I did laugh at some things, we have a modern-day comedy more needless sexual innuendos, sado-masochism offered and the like. Why? If you have a good comedian and a good story, you don't need that garbage. I think most Carvey fans were disappointed with this film.

This movie is one of my favorite comedies. I saw it before I knew that Dana Carvey was Garth from Wayne's World (this was before my great interest in Cinema and now know everything about films in the '90s and '00s). I found it to be very entertaining and have seen it many times since. I love it when an ex-SNL actor is able to star in a movie that is not based on a Character they did on SNL (Mike Myers in So I Married and Axe Murderer, Adam Sandler in Billy Madison, and Chris Farley, David Spade in Tommy Boy). Carvey has this charm about him as seeming like a regular guy. He does not seem like the Hollywood type. I think he is highly underrated and I hope he can find his niche again. Clean Slate is the comedy version of Memento, or Memento is the serious version of Clean Slate. I heard that Adam Sandler was producing a script Dan Carvey wrote, so I hope something comes of that.