Is there anything as jarringly great as a brilliant actor you associate with comedies showing up in a drama?
Whether it be Kevin Hart killing it in Fatherhood, Adam Sandler in Uncut Gems, or hell Jordan Peele randomly showing up and pulling Get Out from nowhere, it can lead to some of the best films around.
In the case of one film that has just recently been discovered by Netflix viewers, Jim Carrey inhabits a serious role, and is joined by an absolutely all star cast.
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Singer-songwriter and actor Suki Waterhouse stars in the film, a dystopian cannibal thriller, and is joined by Jason Momoa and even Keanu Reeves.
It follows Waterhouse’s character, called Arlen, being kidnapped by a community of cannibals led by Momoa’s character, Miami Man.
No really that’s his name. Keanu Reeves is called The Dream. Carrey is called The Hermit.
Check out the trailer and see if you think this bonkers thriller is for you.
The film in question is called The Bad Batch, and it was released in 2016 by writer-director Ana Lily Amirpour.
One fan tweeted saying: “I had no idea that Jim Carrey was in the movie Bad Batch his character is just so random.
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“He’s an old man”.
Carrey has a limited role in the film, only filming on set for five days.
Despite this, reviews at the time were mixed, but much of the praise was for Carrey.
One Indiewire writer, Eric Kohn, tweeted: “Jim Carrey is amazing, and totally different, in The Bad Batch. Too bad he's not talking about it. He should “
Kohn released an article at the time about how Carrey puts in an amazing performance in the film, but for some reason is not promoting it.
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Kohn said: “While he only appears in a handful of scenes, The Hermit is one of a few memorably outlandish characters in Amirpour’s dark vision, a silent, nomadic figure who roams the desert with a shopping cart and winds up rescuing the film’s amputee heroine (Suki Waterhouse) after she escapes a gang of cannibals”.
At the time of writing, it is unclear why he never participated in the marketing for the film or promoted, but the performance was one of the few highlights of the film.
Though the premise is great, the film was critically panned.
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Receiving a critic score of 45% on Rotten Tomatoes, it averaged a score of 5.2 out of 10 on IMDb.
Jordan Hoffman of Vanity Fair said: “There's just not enough excitement or empathy in this movie to move past ‘yes, this is gruesome, but I get it.’”
This was not a universal opinion, however, with Andrew Pulver of The Guardian saying: “The Bad Batch is expertly constructed and looks great.”
The Bad Batch (2016) is available to watch on Netflix in the UK.
Topics: Jim Carrey, Netflix, TV and Film, Film
Michael Slavin