Must (One Day?) See : I Love You Phillip Morris

Jim Carrey and Ewan McGregor's "gay movie", I Love You Phillip Morris, looks like a solid comedy with a compelling, "based on a true story"-plot, to back it up. Yet the U.S. release date hangs in limbo. Originally slatted for a March release, the date was moved to April and now the end of July. The story of a gay con man who finds true love with his prison cellmate is so far-fetched it could have only happened in real life. The fact that the movie isn't the typically campy gay movie that American mainstream audiences are used to (see: The Birdcage) or a tragedy were gays are marginalized, victims of circumstance (see: The Boys in the Band, Philadelphia, Brokeback Mountain . .) may have something to do with it. The reviews from abroad, where ILYPM has already been released, are positive as is this one from the 2009 Sundance Film Festival where it was screened :

Written by the team responsible for the similarly dark Bad Santa and based on a true story, I Love You Phillip Morris is an extraordinary film that serves as a reminder of just how good Carrey can be when he's not tied into a generic Hollywood crowd-pleaser. His comic timing remains as exquisite as ever, but this is not a loveable rubber-faced rogue. One could argue that, like The Truman Show, this is another film about a lost naif, but when it plays its final hand, I Love You Phillip Morris is really much, much stranger.

Breakthrough, a showcase for Jim Carrey's sometimes untapped talent, with a strange twist ending: why has it taken so long for I Love You Phillip Morris to make it to American megaplexes? Sigh.