RANDOM REVIEW OF THE DAY: Big Fat Liar (2002)

Oh I remember Big Fat Liar. This was like the youth comedy of it's time starring big teen actors at the time. Frankie Muniz from Malcolm in the Middle, Amanda Bynes from Nickelodeon's All That and The Amanda Show, and Paul Giamatti from...wait what is he doing in a tween comedy? Anyways it is unknown what the general adult audience thought of this youth comedy but the tweens and teens seemed to love at the time of its release, and when I was young I did not think it has half bad either. So how does it hold up today....eh-ish.  Muniz stars as Jason a teenage boy who loves to come up with ridiculous lies to get him out of trouble. When we writes a paper for a creative writing assignment a stuck-up and arrogant Hollywood filmmaker named Marty Wolf (Paul Giamatti) steals the homework and turns it into a movie. As Jason tries to convince his teacher and his parents that Wolf stole his homework and had turned it into a movie, they unsurprisingly don't believe him, based on the many outrageous lies he made in the past. So Jason teams up with his best friend Kaylee (Amanda Bynes) to travel to Los Angeles and fight for the credit he deserves for the story that Wolf had stolen from him. The film has its' ups, downs, mediocrity, and passable elements which I think make it nothing special, but at the same time kind of harmless.



My emotions run pretty high with the characters in this film. For example, I absolutely LOVE Frankie Muniz in Malcolm in the Middle. His delivery, his comedic timing, and his talent for doing comedic fourth-wall jokes totally sell. But whenever he is in something else like a different film, such as this, he does not do a thing for me.It is because of two reason, one his delivery in anything else besides Malcolm in the Middle is so dry and uninteresting and it can make me care less for whatever character he is playing. The other reason is that in everything Muniz does he plays the SAME character. The awkward, nerdy, unfunny, and constantly bullied dweeb. I know he plays the dweeb in Malcolm in the Middle, but the difference with that dweeb he plays in the show and the dweeb in this film is that the dweeb from the show is funny. This character is not. And whenever hes does try to deliver a joke or one-liner, it falls flat. Even when he tries to act "cool" whenever it is played as comedic or not, it still falls flat and just comes out as awkward and dry. I know he was a popular guy at his time but even  when I was at a younger age I thought he was really overrated in a lot of other productions he has done. Amanda Bynes on the other hand for some reason, I can't find it in me to criticize her in almost anything she does. Maybe it's the fact that she really is talented or just the nostalgia I have of watching her in All That and The Amanda Show because I know she had always made me laugh in those even to today. Either way I love watching her in anything she is in, because she just cracks me up, she seems really into whatever role she is playing, and I believe she can sell as a comedic actress even though she is not really varied in any other genre besides comedy. But I still enjoy her. Actually I think she and Muniz should have switched characters, she she should have been the main focus of the film. If that was the case I highly believe that this film could have been funnier if she was the revenge-seeking type lead against the egotistical and over the top Giamatti. When I come think about it that actually sounds pretty hilarious, so hilarious in fact I can picture it in my head. But sadly, what you see is what you get. Finally we have Paul Giamatti, who for me I am sort of a mixed bag on. Sometimes he's funny, sometimes he's unfunny, some times he seems interesting, sometimes he's uninteresting, sometimes his performance enjoyable, sometimes it gets obnoxious, sometimes he seems invested, sometimes it looks like he doesn't give a hoot, etc. It is a very rolller coaster-type performance, it has many ups and downs. But I think the main issue with that is that the character was written to be so despicable and obnoxious through Paul Giamatti's acting he seemed to pull it off okay. So overall it just an okay character, but could have better if he was a bit more tolerable. 


I think the story itself  is pretty original and it could have been a lot fun. I think they just got the wrong talent to make sure that would be a reality. Not all the talent are awful, like I said earlier Amanda Bynes is good and Paul Giamatti is just okay, but with Frankie Muniz and some of the dialogue and joke writing all seem to fall flat. Which to me is a disaster since the jokes and Muniz's character are supposed to be the center of this film. We want to relate and enjoy the main character and enjoy a lot of these jokes, but they just don't seem to work. The story on its own I think is fun, but if the screenplay got another rewrite, the rewrote the main character a bit, got a different male teen actor to portray him, or like I said earlier switched Bynes' and Muniz's characters, we maybe would have got something close to special. But as it is it isn't anything harmful, disrespectful, or insulting. For children at least I think its okay for them, it isn't really made for a more mature audience. From my perspective there is not anything in the film that talks down to children or treats them like their dumb, it is one of those films that offer just as much a child would want in their type of comedy. To me it's average and as a child I liked it and as I am older I see it as nothing harmful or idiotic. It had potential, it could have been more with the changes I recommended, but if it already seems interesting to one, chances are that they will be the fan. 

GRADE: AP+