journal features

movie review - There's Something About Mary

the journal of Michael Werneburg

twenty-seven years and one million words

Toronto, 1998.07.17

This is a screwball comedy designed to teeter at the edge of being too obnoxious. It features a young woman with several suitors of varying character. With semi-plot-related scenes stitched together with scenes of moderately offensive humor it certainly stakes out its own space. Everything about the film, its sets and the seemingly endless sunshine included, supports a story that doesn't take itself too seriously and lets its gross comedy strut its stuff. There's not a lot else to say; the best of the suitors prevails in a satisfying fashion (he wins the girl through earning the respect of her handicapped brother) and we see the last of the rest of the creeps.

Recommended.

rand()m quote

It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbled, or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena; whose face is marred by the dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming; who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions and spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best, knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who, at worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly; so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory or defeat.

—Theodore Roosevelt, Jr.