![]() Nobody quite knows how to connect Kaufman and his devotion to transcendental meditation, but it makes total sense when combined with footage of Kaufman earnestly asking Maharishi Mahesh Yogi a wonderfully convoluted question about the role of entertainment once everybody becomes enlightened. I could watch a full documentary of Danny DeVito and Marilu Henner telling stories about interactions with Kaufman and, in one notorious incident, Tony Clifton on the set of Taxi. Thank You Very Much is on steadiest footing when it’s clear that people are still entirely flummoxed by Kaufman and his real motivations and don’t pretend to understand. And did Andy really dislike post-sex intimacy? Shrug. Do I believe that Andy’s stint as a misogynist heel, challenging women to wrestling matches, was mostly about getting laid? A mud wrestler nicknamed The Red Snapper says so, so it might be true, which isn’t the same as being interesting. Do I believe Andy Kaufman might have been shaped by his parents lying to him about his beloved grandfather’s death? Yes, but it’s such a textbook piece of analysis that it somehow makes him less fascinating. ![]() The more personal the stories are, the less convincing Thank You Very Much becomes. This is mostly Andy Kaufman as recounted by the people who knew him best, rather than as presented by outside observers and pop culture enthusiasts.īut did anybody truly know Kaufman that well? Even folks like longtime collaborator Bob Zmuda and girlfriend Lynne Margulies, who have made a cottage industry out of explaining and defying explanations for him? At most, people seemed to be on Kaufman’s wavelength or to have participated gamely in his various shenanigans. From there, it goes back to his origins and through his biography. We meet Andy on the stage of New York’s Improvisation Comedy Club, giving a taste of what it might have been like to first be exposed to this strangely accented man delivering garbled punchlines, doing unintelligible impressions and then, at the moment of looming climactic disaster, breaking into an impressive Elvis impression. Either way? Sounds nothing like how Thank You Very Much unfolds. On one hand? Sounds annoying! On the other hand? Sounds potentially brilliant. The documentary starts with Kaufman discussing a movie he wants to make, one that begins with the climax, goes into the closing credits, repeats the climax and eventually, through small variations, tells its story. But Thank You Very Much goes into the psychological dead-end of treating Kaufman as a solvable puzzle.įortunately, it’s easy to enjoy Thank You Very Much without being especially convinced by its reductive incursions into Andy Kaufman’s mind - without being convinced that any film, especially one this relatively conventional, might contribute meaningful answers. ![]() It’s layered with stories about Kaufman’s process, some perfunctory and some delightful in their own right. The documentary is filled with fantastic footage from Kaufman’s fearless performances, mostly familiar but still wildly iconoclastic. This is the problem that Alex Braverman’s new documentary Thank You Very Much runs into. Venue: Venice Film Festival (Venice Classics)
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