At the peak of his career, riding high on acclaimed performances in Walk the Line and Two Lovers, Joaquin Phoenix announced that he was retiring from acting to become a hip-hop artist. He grew a beard, started wearing ill-fitting suits and made a series of chaotic TV appearances in which he seemed to have completely lost the plot. The media reported this with scepticism, and credibility was further strained by the fact that Phoenix's brother-in-law Affleck was documenting what looked like a nervous breakdown.

It was fairly clear back in 2008 that Phoenix's shambolic rapper was a joke, yet he and Affleck insisted it was real. There isn't a believable moment in this film, which perhaps tells us more about the insular world of celebrity than anything they were trying to say about the gullible media. Even revisiting the notorious Letterman interview or Stiller's hilarious impersonation at the Oscars reminds us that we always knew it was a hoax.

So why didn't Affleck take a Borat-like approach, exposing the media's slavish dedication to gossip? But then the media never reported Phoenix's transformation as fact. The other option would have been to take a 30 Rock approach with Phoenix sending up his own image as well as the self-serving, over-serious way celebrities see themselves. But by micro-managing the depiction of his collapse, this doesn't emerge either.

In the end, this film merely seems to document something Affleck and Phoenix thought was hilarious at the time. Are the full-frontal scenes of Phoenix's long-suffering assistants McHale and Langdon supposed to hint at sexuality issues or is that an accidental layer of meaning here? And was having Casey's dad playing Joaquin's dad at the end supposed to be the final wink at the audience? Whatever it is, the film is watchably strange and often quite funny, but perhaps what it actually tells us is that some stars can't see themselves as clearly as they think they can.

themes, strong language, nudity, drugs

16.Oct.10