Man on the Moon

Directed by Milos Forman
Starring Jim Carrey, Danny DeVito, Paul Giamatti, Courtney Love
USA, 1999
Rated R (brief sex and nudity, language)

B

THE ENTERTAINER ENTERTAINS HIMSELF
Man on the Moon is almost too special to be assigned a rating. I love it and hate it simultaneously. I mean, what can you say about a supposed biopic about Andy Kaufman that has Kaufman (Jim Carrey) beginning the film by thanking the audience for coming, announcing that the movie was unsatisfactory to him, and that he decided to edit it till there was nothing left. Using the mannerisms of his signature Latka Gravas character from the sitcom Taxi, Kaufman tells the audience that he will roll the credits since there is no movie. After that, the screen goes blank and stays that way for several seconds and then Kaufman reappears, reassuring viewers, explaining that that was just a prank to rid the audience of people who would not understand Man on the Moon’s uncanny execution of putting the life, or more like the antics, career, and spirit, of Andy Kaufman on screen. It is a marvelous prank and gives the audience a tiny glimpse of what is ahead: a Jim Carrey performance that is beyond criticism, and a movie that is dizzying, angering, and enlightening.

Much of Man on the Moon insulted me initially. I knew little about Andy Kaufman when I walked into the theater, and knew only a tad bit more about his life when I exited. The movie lives in its joyous and painful recreations of Kaufman’s stage performances and his television appearances. What annoyed me was Kaufman’s ceaseless toying with his audience’s minds. Man on the Moon, which gets its title from the brilliant song from R.E.M.’s Automatic for the People album, chronicles Kaufman’s career, which, I assume, was his life. The movie teaches us very little about Kaufman’s motivation and why he pulled the pranks he did. We must deduce ourselves what his underlying intentions were. Kaufman’s human qualities (he is, indeed, as inexplicable as a man on the moon) are enigmatic, complex, and never fully realized on film.

The man refused to follow the rules of normalcy and the industry in which he worked and banished all things common from the world he created and enveloped himself in. He was fired from comic stand-up stints early in his career because he insisted he was not a comedian but a ‘song-and-dance’ man. At a comedy improv club, he was discovered by entertainment manager George Shapiro, played by Danny DeVito who, by fulfilling the role of Kaufman’s manager, is unable to reprise his role from the Taxi sitcom. After Andy is discovered, he is offered the sitcom, Taxi, which he immediately wants to turn down. He considers sitcoms to be the lowest form of entertainment and he wants control over his comedy. Being level-headed, as managers must be if they want their artistry-preserving clients to succeed in a nasty business, Shapiro convinces Andy that this will be his only chance at stardom and if he doesn’t take the offer, he will not get any others. Andy reluctantly takes the job when he is promised his own special on TV. Much of Taxi’s cast members, including Marilu Henner, Christopher Lloyd, and Judd Hirsch, appear in Man on the Moon’s recreations of the show’s famous moments, and they all look either in awe of or full of hatred for Andy.

It is easy to see why Andy Kaufman was infamous before and even after his death. Some people just want to be entertained by a comedian. Kaufman keeps messing with his audiences’ heads, drawing them into his loony and often bizarre world of comedy and self-parody. Kaufman, his behavior, and the movie mock viewers’ expectations by shocking them. Kaufman is portrayed as having a certain indecipherable idealism that is all his own- almost as if it’s in a code that can’t be cracked by humans. We see Kaufman take on his dismayed viewers in several scenes by putting them to sleep by reading the entire book of The Great Gatsby and saying insulting sexist remarks and wrestling women because of them. It seems pretty obvious that Kaufman’s mission was to experiment and study a performer’s relationship with an audience and prove to them that life is just an illusion. But Kaufman is not as easy as that. He even has an ugly alter-ego, a fat and unpleasant lounge singer (if you can call what he does ‘singing’) named Tony Clifton, who acts as a part of Kaufman’s conflicting ying-and-yang personality. And Kaufman finds love with one of the women who jumped at the chance to wrestle with him and his sexist facade on a Merv Griffin show, Lynn Marguiles (Courtney Love). While there are a select few in the movie who appreciate Andy’s unique expression of humor, no one understands him, which may be more of a blessing on him than a curse. Man on the Moon is favorable to Andy Kaufman and his mysterious comic style, but it never mkaes the presumptuous error of pretending to understand him, a fatal mistake many biopics make.

I like to think Andy Kaufman loved his audience, even when he wrestled with them. Maybe he was trying to teach them something- trying to lead his own small revolution against conformity in life and artistry. When he fought with his audience, he fought with the world’s system of ordinariness. Man on the Moon is insanely funny, but only when Kaufman’s comic skits succeed. Many times, his performances go very wrong and it is painful to watch. Kaufman knew how interesting a performance-gone-awry could be and he built on that, I suppose. The audience never knew what was up his sleeve and that is how he contributed to the sense of illusion that was at the heart of his comedy. Man on the Moon takes a backstage look at how most of Andy’s ugly personalities and antics on stage were just a way of riling up the audience. Even though Andy’s performances bordered on being irrational and irritating, they were original, and Kaufman’s duplicity became more human when he was faced with the reality of his lung cancer condition.

Jim Carrey’s performance lies in his on-target mimicry of his lifetime hero, Kaufman. People have criticized the performance, saying it is nothing but excellent imitation and does not bring out the human in Kaufman, but I disagree. In Man on the Moon, Andy Kaufman’s life is one big, schizophrenic, and wild performance and his entire high school mentality and lifestyle is brought out onstage. He is religious and difficult to love, characteristics that are human and brought out in his performances. Courtney Love, a very good actor and rock star, is not given a meaty role, but she is very much alive in it. I felt exactly like her character throughout watching the movie- her confusion and eventual love and slight understanding of what lies within Kaufman paralleled my early bewilderment at Man on the Moon’s not-quite-sane hero.

Milos Forman, the director, has made biopics before (Amadeus, The People Vs. Larry Flynt), but the Czech auteur is not one to go for what is linear. All his biopics, including this one, indulge in weirdness and offbeat atmospheres. Man on the Moon is more about Andy Kaufman’s spirit than his life; more about his career and his mental and spiritual goals that were manifest in it than about factual information. I find Forman’s approach to the film biography more successful than the normal, admiring looks at heroes’ lives. Forman focuses on the psychological worlds his characters have created more than he focuses on what made them famous. I don’t think Kaufman will ever be fully understood, but his existence stands for a sort of innocence that refuses to go along with set standards; perhaps an innocence greater than that of those who quietly and meekly follow the leader.

Sadly, I cannot remember more than a few moments in the film that I loved. The movie's story is not memorable; its zaniness is. People will not likely respond to it emotionally because it is not an emotional film. Its subtext lies deep below its crazy surface, and the surface is not very glossy. It may frighten some people away because Kaufman was such an erratic, insane fellow. The intense irritation he brought about in his audience is brought out in us, and in that way, Man on the Moon emulates the methods of Kaufman, but also confuses and annoys its audience.

I will probably form several opinions on Andy Kaufman’s strange philosophies in the next few days. Even though I probably wouldn’t have liked him on first impression, I think he was one of the few comic geniuses of the past century. He was not a serious man at all, though his personality seemed streaked with confusion and duality. He mocked the very being of modern entertainment and, strangely enough, that was how he entertained. What was God thinking when he made this man? I have a feeling that He wanted to point out to us silly earthlings that we are taking things too seriously down here with our pointless systems and routines and fear of originality. In that way, Kaufman’s life seems more like a message from the Lord than a man’s survival. And thank heaven for him- now we know God has a wonderful sense of humor.

By Andrew Chan

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