Jim & Andy: The Great Beyond

After seeing Jim Carrey out of the spotlight for a while, but then recently back in the news with what could be described as "odd" behavior, I was curious as to what this movie would deliver. I was not disappointed. I have always been an admirer of Carrey's work, beginning with my introduction to his comedy on the sketch comedy show In Living Color. This movie/behind the scenes look at Carrey's acting focuses on how Jim essentially "became" Andy Kauffman for his role in Man on the Moon. This is a documentary not only about taking on the mindset and mannerisms of another person, but so much more. It helps explain who Jim Carrey has become... and it is brilliant. Most audiences are used to seeing Jim Carrey being over-the-top, but in this doc Jim shares with the viewer a very intimate piece of himself, which could shed light on most viewers perception of reality. I certainly look at life a little differently now after viewing this. I also have a better understanding of who Jim Carrey is as well. Jim becoming Andy changes how he views life, and as he profoundly says "the choices make you." This documentary was the best and realest thing I have seen in years.

Jim Carrey was one of my favorite actors as a child. Andy Kaufman fascinated me as a young man. Yet, this incredible new documentary tries to convey that Jim and Andy are two sides of the same coin. Two human beings that learned how to be free through their art. It is all about the making of Man on the Moon, one of the most underrated biopics of all time and in my mind, the crowning achievement of Jim Carrey's career. Carrey didn't simply impersonate Andy Kaufman. Andy Kaufman possessed Jim Carrey. Through never before behind the scenes footage, we see Carrey slowly disappear into Kaufman and whether it was intentional method acting or not is unknown. Carrey came into the project as the hottest comedy star in the world and came out something completely different.

... and What of Andy Kaufman? Many say he's dead and many say he's still alive somewhere, playing a big gag that we just don't know about. Andy was mysterious like that. But his spirit exists, somewhere in our universe. Anyone with the bravery to be different from everyone else, in essence is an Andy.

Few things get me more emotional than Andy Kaufman. Even hearing a few words of R.E.M.'s "Man on the Moon" makes my eyes well up. I remember watching his early appearances live on Saturday Night Live and the night he got into a fist fight on Fridays. And while I was alive for his descent into pro wrestling mania and his battle with cancer, I don't remember much of the end. Maybe I didn't want to process it. Maybe that's why I believed — to this day — that Andy is just waiting to pull the curtain back on all of us and come back. And maybe not coming back? Perhaps that's his best trick of all.

Conversely, I've never liked Jim Carrey. Unlike Andy, who undermined his own popularity and resisted the mainstream while simultaneously making a living from it, he seemed too eager to please. Too happy to take and take from the blockbuster machine, to be in works that didn't challenge him. That's why The Cable Guy surprised me. Here as the buffoon who mugged his way through Dumb and Dumber forcing viewers to contemplate the pain behind the character. He followed that movie with later challenging films like The Truman Show and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.

The Jim Carrey that appears here is not the rubber-faced maniac who seemed to cry out, "Watch me! Love me!" This is a graying, faded, bearded, rougher man who has been through no small degree of personal loss and pain. And this is also a man who willingly gave his identity over to not just Andy Kaufman, but to Andy's more frightening side, the villainous Tony Clifton.

In a recent Newsweek article, Kaufman's sister gives some insight: "I think that Jim Carrey was a vessel," she said. " I do believe he allowed Andy to come through him. I also chose to believe that Andy was coming through him. When he looked at me, I'm not kidding. It was like speaking to Andy from the great beyond. I felt like he was coming through as the evolved, astral Andy."

I've watched Milos Forman's Man on the Moon numerous times. And I've read plenty of books, digested plenty of articles and watched every appearance Andy did on TV. I look to him in the way that I extend to few performers: he's more of a truth-speaking prophet than just a person. Do I give him too much credit? Do I see things in him, do I project magic that he wasn't able to perform? I think — I fervently believe — that he was something more. A force. Someone who was able to push buttons, upset people and be a real-life wrestling heel while at the same time delivering childlike moments of whimsy and wonder. Just the footage of him inviting everyone to join him for milk and cookies after his Carnegie Hall performance makes me weep openly. It feels too real, too loving, too honest and much too true.

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Andy Kaufman offered a hilarious - and sometimes disturbing - reflection on comedy, celebrity, and being human. Then Jim Carrey became Andy Kaufman...and everything started all over again. This film is so much more than interviews and lost footage. It is a meditation on fame. Even more, it is a meditation on the thin line between make believe and reality. There's something to learn in the space between.

The film covers Jim a lot more than Andy. It certainly makes an impact. They are both very complicated people and it becomes clear that if anyone was going to play Andy Kaufman it had to be Jim Carrey. He got about as close as anyone ever could.

In the interview sections Jim comes across charming and occasionally says some very profound and insightful things. The on set footage shows a very different person. He chose to approach the role as a hardcore method actor. Insisting on being called his characters names and never breaking character, even around Andy's family. Some of it is brutal and hard to watch. He is nothing short of an obnoxious, unhinged, tempormental nightmare. Especially when he plays Tony. There are many times when I feel sorry for the crew and his costars. Outside of the craft of acting there is a serious case to be made for Carrey being committed. He seems legitimately insane. That being said so did Andy and maybe Jim had to do that in order to temporarily become him.

The only fault I can identify with Jim's performance is that there was a sweetness about Andy and his funny antics. There is a dark anger in Jim which occasionally leaks out. Still I think Jim got as close as anyone could to capturing Andy.

My overall impression is that Andy Kaufman was a strange and beautiful performance artist. Jim Carrey is brilliant and troubled actor. I love watching his movies, but, I probably would not want to work with him.