Motivational speaker Jack Corcoran (Bill Murray) has just learned his father died. Actually, he’s just learned that he had a father. You see, his mother had told him that his father died while saving a small boy from drowning. In reality, his mother packed her bags and left the irresponsible Kirby Corcoran, who went on to become a circus clown. As part of his will, Kirby has saddled Jack with the responsibility of taking care of Vera, an elephant.
Jack has also been saddled with paying $35,000 in damages caused by the elephant. To come up with the money, Jack must take Vera across the country to San Diego, where he can sell Vera to either an animal trainer (Linda Fiorentino) or an activist (Janeane Garofalo). Along the way, Jack encounters one of his father’s old circus buddies (Pat Hingle), who teaches him some of the tricks that Vera did in his father’s act. Of course, these will come in handy later in the movie.
Anytime an animal is the co-star of a comedy, there’s usually going to be some attempt at manipulating the audience’s emotions as well. Larger than Life contains a little of that formulaic “bonding with the animal” stuff, but, by and large, sticks to being a “road movie” that gets Jack and Vera in and out of situations as they travel cross country.
This is pretty standard stuff, with only a few scenes being out-and-out funny and only one really being hilarious. Murray seems uninspired through much of the film, as does most of the cast. Only Matthew McConaughey possesses any manic energy as a crazed truck driver who Jack swindles into helping him.
There’s nothing really wrong with Larger than Life, it’s just a rather bland comedy featuring a comedian who has done much funnier movies, like Groundhog Day, Kingpin and Mad Dog and Glory. Still, for a younger audience, there’s nothing too offensive to worry about and it might work as a good rental for the age 8-12 set.
3.0 out of 5.0 stars
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