Bruce Almighty Film Review

• Released: 2003
• Producer: Tom Shadyac, James D. Brubaker, Jim Carrey, Mark O'Keefe, Steve Koren, Michael Bostick,.
• Director: Tom Shadyac
• Running time: 101 mins
• Genre: Comedy, Supernatural Fantasy, Fantasy
• Budget: $81 million

The Film

Bruce Nolan lives with his girlfriend, Grace and he works for a News channel in New York called WKBW-TV as a field reporter. His dream is to become the anchorman for the channel when Pete Fineman retires. The problem is, he's got a rival and his name is Evan Baxter.

Bruce ends up getting fired from his job after saying something rude on camera and this leads him to questioning God into why things are falling apart in his life. When he starts getting messages on his pager to phone a number, he initially ignores them. He throws the pager into the road and it gets broken by a car which runs over it. But yet the pager still buzzes for him to phone a number, so he eventually does. When he talks to the person on the other end of the phone, he is told to go to a very large and empty warehouse. This confuses him as it it all white and empty. This is where he meets God in human form, played by Morgan Freeman.

God wants Bruce to know that he's doing his job right, so he offers him his powers to prove a point. In the beginning, he's surprised and can't figure out what's going on. But he soon gets used to his new abilities, even walking on water. And we start to see some very comical things, like the dog using the toilet!

Throughout the film we see how Bruce makes people do the silliest things, including a scene where Even is reading the news and starts talking gibberish. I did find some rather touching moments in the film though. There are times when he can hears prayers from people, millions of them around the world. At one point he hears a prayer from Grace praying that she would get God to help her stop loving Bruce. This really moves Bruce and prompts him into doing something about his situation.

Jim Carrey brings his usual slapstick hilarity into this film. He doesn't disappoint. He's a very funny actor and we clearly see this throughout the film. I think him and Jennifer Aniston work well together. I liked Morgan Freeman's role in it as well as God. This may seem a bit bizarre and strange as times while watching the movie, but it does have some very touching moments in it too, I thought. Especially, as I mentioned, when he hears the prayers from Grace. This does give him the motivation he needs to get his life in gear and get things sorted out.

I found it a very charming and funny film. I've always liked Jim Carrey as an actor and have seen him in quite a few films. He's always had a lot of energy and he's a funny guy. In contrast, Morgan Freeman who plays God is much calmer. This works well with Carrey's high level of energy. I've seen this film before, but I still enjoy watching it from time to time. I sometimes enjoy watching films again anyway as you miss things first time round.

At the time of writing this review, this film is available to watch on Amazon Prime.