Bobby Farrelly gives foolish men enough confidence to keep making trouble, and actors enough room to make them funny. We recommend the better comedies with reservations about repeated jokes and kindness that the writing does not always practise.
Fi1m perspective
In Dumb and Dumber (1994), Jim Carrey's Lloyd Christmas turns even a small reaction into an elaborate facial performance. We laughed at his extravagant mugging, then felt slightly foolish: his willingness to work so hard at being ridiculous had won us over. The screenplay by Bobby Farrelly, Peter Farrelly and Bennett Yellin gives Carrey and Jeff Daniels repeated opportunities to fail at ordinary tasks. Their double act makes the trip worthwhile. The bathroom jokes sometimes ask us to keep laughing after the surprise has gone.
That film began Bobby's screenwriting partnership with his brother Peter; Kingpin (1996) brought them together as co-directors. In There's Something About Mary (1998), their blend of romantic comedy and gross-out jokes depends heavily on Cameron Diaz's ease. She gives Mary a warmth that stops the surrounding male commotion becoming oppressive. The screenplay, credited to Ed Decter, John J. Strauss and the brothers, gives her too little chance to be unreasonable or ridiculous herself. It is a funny film with a lopsided view of who gets to have fun, and it runs too long.
Shallow Hal (2001), written with Sean Moynihan, makes the brothers' interest in kindness explicit. Jack Black plays a man hypnotised into seeing people's inner qualities, and his delight in Gwyneth Paltrow's Rosemary is touching because he never treats it as a joke. Paltrow makes each compliment uneasy: Rosemary is waiting for the insult to follow. But the frequent cuts to her prosthetic suit keep encouraging the laughter that the lesson about inner beauty is meant to correct. We believe the brothers mean well; the film keeps giving us reasons to wish they had thought harder.
Their straightforward visual style lets performers carry the outrageous scenes, a sensible choice when the casting is this good. They are less sure about when to stop, a problem already apparent in the recurring jokes of Dumb and Dumber. Bobby later made his solo feature directing debut with Champions (2023). Start with There's Something About Mary, allowing for a romantic comedy whose heroine gets fewer jokes than she deserves.
Biography
Bobby Farrelly is an American film director, screenwriter and producer. He is one of the Farrelly brothers, working frequently with his brother Peter on comedy films. He was born on 17 June 1958 in Cumberland, Rhode Island, and graduated from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.
Farrelly co-wrote Dumb and Dumber (1994), which was directed by his brother. The brothers co-directed and co-wrote Kingpin (1996), There's Something About Mary (1998), Me, Myself & Irene (2000), Shallow Hal (2001) and The Heartbreak Kid (2007). Farrelly made his solo directorial debut with Champions (2023). He has also directed episodes of television series including Trailer Park Boys and Loudermilk.
