BRUCE ALMIGHTY
US, 2003, 104 minutes, Colour.
Jim Carrey, Morgan Freeman, Jennifer Aniston, Philip Baker Hall, Stephen Carrell, Sally Kirkland, Catherine Bell, Nora Dunn.
Directed by Tom Shadyac.
Film director, Tom Shadyac, is a practising Catholic. For some moviegoers, this might be something of a surprise because Shadyac is best known for broad, popular comedies with Jim Carrey, Eddie Murphy and Robin Williams. He made The Nutty Professor, Liar, Liar and Patch Adams. Bruce Almighty, is another Jim Carrey comedy. But it is also a film about God, God's providence, human free will and prayer.
Carrey is Bruce Nolan, a television reporter, who feels that he is being passed over at the station, that exasperating things always happen to him, that God has something against him. It's the kind of feeling that many of us have from time to time. What is God doing to us?
Bruce gets his answer when God calls him to a warehouse and appears to him, not in clouds and trumpet blasts, but as a janitor-electrician who seems to find doing some manual work a relief to all the thinking and guiding he has to do. Morgan Freeman is an actor with great dignity and gravity with a beautiful speaking voice and he brings those qualities to his portrayal of God. God also has a fine sense of humour and some witty one-liners. God gives over his powers to Bruce for a week to see if he can manage things any better.
What Bruce discovers is that he is rather self-centred and that he uses his powers, often in petty ways to annoy people, just for himself. When God arranges a meeting with Bruce on top of Mount Everest so that they can admire creation, he urges Bruce to think beyond himself and to think about people's prayers. Bruce is somewhat overwhelmed, especially when he finds that one of the most constant of people praying is his girlfriend - who has the significant name, Grace. Bruce begins to see the world rather differently, through God's eyes.
Perhaps this makes the film sound more serious than it is. All this reflection on God and prayer is set within a funny comedy. Fans of Jim Carrey now know that he can do clowning slapstick comedy but, after The Truman Show, that he can do more witty and thoughtful comedy as well.
People often say that they should make more positive films and films with moral and religious values. Tom Shadyac has been able to combine truly important themes with a popular comedy.
1. The work of Jim Carrey with Tom Shadyac, Tom Shadyac's list of comedies? Broad American comedy, underlying seriousness, an approach to entertaining an adult audience?
2. The Buffalo settings, the city, downtown, homes? Television studios? Niagara Falls? The songs, the musical score - and the use of satiric music like the opening with Chariots of Fire?
3. Themes of Hollywood religion, God incarnate in different stars, in Morgan Freeman? The film as reality and fantasy? The themes of God, power, prayer, free will, God listening, intervening or not in personal lives, in world events? Free will and making choices? Humans making a mess through free will? Consequences of choices? Nature and the repercussions? The question of how to make someone love us while allowing them free will - God's question and our question? The difference between magic tricks, day-by-day miracles of people being heroic in their ordinary lives?
4. Jim Carrey as Bruce, his comic style and presence, jokes, faces, pratfalls, comic style? Nearing forty, not married, Grace in his live? His ability to make people laugh, his wit (and God telling him that that was his gift)? Yet narcissistic? The opening comedy, the television interview, the hairnet, the cookie, the interviews - serious, humorous? His theme of Buffalo being like a giant cookie (and Evan later stealing it)? His watching it with Grace, not wanting to work on the photo album, his hopes for the anchor position?
5. Things going wrong, the dog in the house, going into the puddles, his job, being late, the traffic, the clashes with Evan, Evan getting the job? The interviews with Jack, going to Niagara Falls, calling Grace, hearing the news about the anchor, freezing on-screen, his angers and abuse, being thrown out, meeting the old man with the notices, his being bashed by the group (and later using his powers against them with the monkey)? Their destroying his car, writing "Hero" on the side?
6. Grace, nice, in love with Bruce, her work, donating blood (and this theme coming back later with his accident)? Listening to him, supporting him, the photo album, going to work, her reaction after Bruce had his experience with God, the moon, the sexual encounter, her breasts, the massage, going to the restaurant, expecting him to propose to her, the Tony Bennett song? The news that he was made anchor, her reaction to his complaints about the noise? Her refusal to go to his party, the phone calls, eventually going, seeing him with Susan, her being upset, leaving? Her praying - the messages on the internet, Bruce looking in her window? Her selfless prayer about her love for Bruce? Bruce visiting her at the school, trying to make her love him - but her exercising free will and refusing to love him?
7. The phone call, the various messages, Bruce throwing the phone out the window, its being run over? Taking the dog out, deciding to go to the building, the puddle, meeting the janitor, the electrician - and God introducing himself? Bruce's reaction, thinking him mad? The filing cabinet - and its being proved not to be a trick? Asking how many fingers were being held up? His change, going out, the traffic, pretending he was Clint Eastwood, standing at the top of the tower with the lightning? Going to the diner, moving the sugar, parting the tomato soup like the Red Sea? God and his arrival, trying to get Bruce to be selfless, their walking on water? The car, the moon and bringing it closer, the hydrant, singing like the BeeGees?, the sexual encounter with Grace? The humour of his going to the station, being mean to Evan and disrupting his delivery of the news? The dogs, finding Jimmy Hoffa's body, filling the television van with marijuana, the meteor landing, everybody winning the lottery? The buzz of prayers in his head, God's advice, filing cabinets, posters, the files on the computer? Millions of prayers unanswered? His giving the easy answer and not thinking about the consequences?
8. Going to the restaurant, announcing his job? Walking out after Grace left, finding himself on Mount Everest? God urging him to think of others, his getting the job, Buffalo winning the match and the city rioting? Angers about the consequences of what he had done? Japan and the tidal waves? His leaving the anchor, accepting God and the reality? Begging for God's forgiveness, being hit by the truck - and God's offhand comment on that? His attempt at a prayer - and God dismissing it as suitable for Miss America? His being alive, getting the blood?
9. The finale with the blood campaign, the giant cookie, the cook picking his nose again and his mother giving a speech? Everybody sharing the happiness, his pointing out Grace?
10. The old man with the placards, the humorous puns on messages usually seen on placards? The old man turning into God?
11. The visual humour of the film, Jim Carrey's ability to be a clown? The sequence with Evan delivering the news? The saying of the word "good" - and God joining in at the end? Verbal humour, wisecracks, especially God's remarks?
12. Popular film, success in the United States and elsewhere, helping ordinary audiences to think about God, control of the world, prayer, free will - and the image of Grace praying a genuine prayer? A film that is better than a sermon?
