When I Love You Philip Morris opens in the US in December, it will be almost two years since it premiered at the Sundance Film Festival. It's a film that no one in the US wants to touch even though the film stars Jim Carrey in a surprisingly good performance.
The film concerns the true story of Steven Russell (Carrey), who re-evaluated his life after a car accident and realized that he was really gay. Trying to live the life he always wanted he finds himself in trouble with the law, and eventually in prison, where he falls in love with the titled person (Ewan McGregor). Adventures in and out of jail occur as Carey and McGregor try to get together.
Despite its being in limbo, this is actually a good little film. Is it the best film ever to come down the pike? No, but it's a film that I actually found myself liking as I watched the import DVD. For me, once I got past the quirky, jokey attitude which seems to be injected to make the gay angle more palatable to many audiences, I found that the characters carried the film.
Will this win any awards? I doubt it. I also doubt that this will be a memorable film a couple of years down the road. What I do think is that this is a good little film that deserves an audience, and since this is a blog about pointing out misplaced or lost films I would be remiss in not pointing the film out to you, our readers.
I do have to also point out that I think it's a feather in the cap of Carrey, who breaks his typecast mold with what many will see as a daring role.
This is out on DVD elsewhere in the world. It's due for release in the US in December, at least according to IMDB.
A word of warning: this is not the sort of film that's going to play well in the more conservative parts of America because of its subject matter and because of its handling of said relationship. I'm sure the reason it hasn't played yet in the US is that the studios don't know how they are going to handle the "graphic" nature of some of the implied sex. More so how are they going handle anyone who wanders into this and thinks that they are getting a wacky Jim Carrey film and brought the kids?
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