Lo straccione

The Jerk is a great movie that stands out to the world. It's unique and fun in it's different way. Steve Martin plays a simple-minded man who strikes it rich and then falls back to the low-class way. The best part of the movie is the dialogue, it spreads from Martin's tasteless quotes to a different tone everytime. It's a classic movie... Even if it sometimes falls flat.

You've gotta love the 70's. That is a decade that produced some of the greatest comedies, dramas, war films, art films, etc etc. If it's a classic and it was released in the second half of the 20th century, chances are it was the 70's. The Jerk is just another of those classic screwball comedies that we all know and love. It's no Airplane! but it is a lot of fun and has plenty of that same goofy, quirky, and all around bizarre humor. Steve Martin plays Navin Andrews, a man who was raised by a black family in Missouri. On his birthday one year, Navin finally learns that this family of kindly black southerners aren't his real family and so Navin decides to set out and make something of his life by traveling to St. Louis. The film opens with Navin sitting under a staircase next to a movie theater, drinking whiskey with two of his hobo buddies. He introduces himself to the audience saying that he isn't a bum, just a jerk. He then proceeds to tell us of his life and the story goes from there, taking off into all sorts of weird and wacky places with strange characters and events, where hilarity always ensues.

Steve Martin is what makes this movie without a doubt. He is absolutely hysterical and delivers the best lines of the film. The character of Navin is an absolute idiot who can't comprehend the real world to save his life. Thus we see him getting into all sorts of hilarious situations that any normal person would have just found a simplistic way out of. But Navin delivers all the laughs as Steve Martin bumbles around as one of the most entertaining characters I've ever seen in one of these screwball comedies. Great comedy comes from great improv, something this film allegedly has a lot of. And I'll believe it because there are some moments where I could never have seen that put on paper. Moments that could only be conceived by the spontaneous mind of a comedic genius like Steve Martin. I'm talking about those moments when Martin will do something so absurd and so unexpected that you can even see the actors he is with begin to break down. Everyone has fun with this movie, and it makes it all the more enjoyable.

As fun as this movie is, you still have to remember that it is just a screwball comedy. It isn't trying to accomplish anything major, and it just wants to elicit a good laugh. And it definitely did that for me. There are plenty of dumb things about this movie and moments that aren't as funny as others. I can't help but compare this movie to Airplane and its farcical nature. Airplane definitely does a better job than The Jerk and it has a more consistently hilarious spoof tone to it. The Jerk is funny from start to finish and definitely never tries to take itself seriously, but it is really a film you have to put yourself in a much lighter and less intellectual state of mind to watch and enjoy. There's nothing inherently wrong with this brand of comedy, but it is pretty simple. Yet, when done right, you get great results, and I can't deny that The Jerk does it right.

Films like these I can only enjoy to a certain extent, and that is solely based off of personal opinion. The Jerk is a hilarious film and is actually really well made for what it's worth. There is never a dull moment and Steve Martin is hysterical. This film is nothing more than a screwball comedy, and you will know it about fifteen minutes in. As far as comedies go, this one is great, and there is a lot of fun to be had with it.

Navin Johnson (Steve Martin) is down and out. He tells the story of his life. He grew up as a poor black boy with his black family. He's a clueless naive manic idiot who goes to the big city St. Louis. He gets a job at the gas station from Harry Hartounian (Jackie Mason). It's a random series of crazy events. He invents a way to support glasses and salesman Stan Fox (Bill Macy) goes 50-50 with him. A madman (M. Emmet Walsh) is after him for no good reason. He escapes to join the carnival as Guess Your Weight. He's taken by rough stunt bike rider Patty Bernstein (Catlin Adams) but he falls for sweet Marie (Bernadette Peters). Marie runs away and he ends up in L.A. That's where he reconnects with Stan Fox and finds out he's wildly rich.

It's ridiculous and it's even funny. Steve Martin is putting all his skills of performance and writing to work in his first feature starring role. It's like half of 'Dumb and Dumber'. That's really my only wish. I wish he had another comedian to play off of. It would be even better if he was a comedy duo. He's funniest when Bernadette Peters is with him. This is completely ridiculous and stupid. That's where most of the humor comes from.

I'm glad that I didn't see this in the theatre, because when I watched it the first time on video, I needed to pause the movie several times just to catch my breath from laughing so hard! Wait a minute...was that the first time, or the tenth time? Playing Navin R. Johnson, the white son of a black family, Steve Martin leaves home to find "his special purpose." By the end of the movie, we all know what that was...to entertain his fans the way he has! As for Navin's special purpose, if you haven't already seen the movie, you aren't going to get any more information than what's here. It takes intelligence to play a complete idiot, and Steve Martin does the job extremely well. Also take note of Martin's costar Bernadette Peters, and the cameo appearances by Jackie Mason and Carl Reiner. Whoever wrote that people who watch "The Jerk" will be quoting its jokes for years after was absolutely right. This was the funniest of Steve Martin's movies!

"The Jerk" is an easy watch, something you can take in quickly and get plenty of good laughs from. While it's not a comedy that strings together laugh-out-loud moments, it has its unique brand of humor grounded in both absurdity and plays on words. It's the kind of humor that's either a hit with someone or doesn't quite do it for them. The more you look back and recall lines and moments from this film, however, the more it grows on you. It's not about the big laughs, but the little things that make "The Jerk" special.

Steve Martin stars as Navin Johnson, a man who grew up thinking he was black and eventually sets out to find his greater purpose. Johnson is naive, stupid, ignorant, but lovable guy, and the film shows how the people around him turn him into...a jerk. This is easily Martin's best character role. He does such a great job handling the subtlety of the humor without playing the absurd moments too over-the-top. He really carries this film.

The odd humor manifests itself through jokes like when Johnson tells his girlfriend Marie (Bernadette Peters) what their time together has felt like, describing first day as feeling like a week, the second day felt like two days, etc. and when he writes home to his family and says "remember when I dreamed about having a big house with _____?" and then he describes with great detail all the absurd rooms in his mansion he could never have actually dreamed of as a child. It's all very original and will definitely appeal more to people who appreciate what makes each joke funny.

So the writing, which is mostly Martin and the acting, which is mostly Martin, are the aspects of the film most worthy of praise. None of the other characters are really written well enough to add anything significant to the comedy, so its the Steven Martin Show. In fact, if you'd told me he did it based on a Saturday Night Live character I would have easily believed you. Either way, this is an odd but easy to love, easy to watch comedy. It's truly different and definitely stands out.