Another You

Eddie Dash (Pryor), a convicted con man, must fulfill 100 hours of community service by taking a recently released mental patient, George (Gene Wilder), to various cultural sites. But what Eddie doesn't know is that George is a compulsive liar. After being frightened in a wax museum, George runs into a bookie who mistakes him for someone named Abe Fielding. He gives George a large sum of money and tells him to meet him at a restaurant that night to receive the remainder. When Eddie and George arrive at the restaurant, everyone mistakes George for Abe Fielding, beer baron. George, the compulsive liar, acts out the role of Abe with gusto and it isn't long before George is living at Abe's mansion and falling in love with his bitter, unresponsive wife, Elaine (Mercedes Ruehl). Eddie soon discovers the whole setup is a con, arranged by the late Abe Fielding's business manager, Dibbs (Stephen Lang), to make it seem as if Abe is still alive, so that his estate won't go into probate and Dibbs can inherit it.

However, after a yodeling duet with George, Elaine--who's really Mimi Kravitz, a struggling actress--falls in love with him. Now Dibbs wants George killed and pays Eddie $10,000 to do away with him on a hunting trip. On the hunting trip, Eddie seemingly shoots George, but during the wake at Abe's brewery, George rises from his coffin and exposes the machinations of Dibbs. After a chase in which George becomes trapped in a brewing machine, Eddie has Dibbs hauled away by the police and George and Mimi get married. In spite of the love interest, it's Eddie and George who share the final fade out together, arms around each other and smiling, holding up a sign reading "Partners Forever."

For a comedy to evoke memories of such embarrassments as ATOLL K, WHAT NO BEER and BIG TROUBLE is a sure sign that something seriously wrong is afoot. And ANOTHER YOU has very serious problems. On the surface, the teaming of Pryor and Wilder is consistent with their successful earlier outings--Pryor as the streetwise con man and Wilder as the excitable innocent. But almost immediately the complementary nature of this pairing is subverted--Pryor's con man is seen conning no one while Wilder, as a compulsive liar, takes up the slack. Pryor himself is relegated to a streetwise black stereotype, making uncouth remarks at women and inviting dogs to perform unnatural acts.

The obvious reason for this imbalance is Pryor's alarming appearance: he looks less like a comic presence than a medical case study. Pryor's illness has flattened and killed his performance, his weakened state unsuccessfully covered up by unseen extras holding him up and Scorcese-like tracking moves with the camera to create the illusion of movement on his part. It is a sad moment for a comedy when attention becomes centered on a lead actor's illness and not his performance--real life creeping in and shattering disbelief like a death mask at a circus. In order to compensate for Pryor, Wilder gears himself to more and more energetic levels. But this energy is misspent and desperate. In his rabbit-like hoppings, high-pitched babblings and crazed smiles and frowns, Wilder labors like a day player trapped in a bad sketch, but he races around the film to no avail.

One critic has remarked that if Richard Pryor needed the money so badly, his friends should have banded together and staged a telethon on his behalf. Seeing ANOTHER YOU brings home that point. Apart from a cynical motive, there is no reason for this film to exist. Quick money is one thing, but exploiting a seriously ill man for profit puts this film in another, more distasteful realm, one more appropriately examined by a social critic than a movie reviewer. (Excessive profanity, adult situations.) leave a comment