JIM-NASTICS

By RICHARD SCHICKEL

Fletcher Reede is a divorced dad, hardworking and ambitious, trying to make partner at a law firm. His adorable son Max (Justin Cooper) is constantly disappointed by his father's failures to keep their dates for ball games and birthday parties, and weary of his lame excuses for going AWOL. Puffing out the candles on his fifth-birthday cake, Fletcher's telephonic explanations for blowing off the event still ringing in his ears, the kid wishes that his father could be forced to tell the truth for 24 hours.

Magically, Max's dream comes true. The premise of Liar Liar is that all the false promises and compliments that ease our paths through the day, all the little evasions that oil the wheels of social and professional, as well as sexual, intercourse are suddenly unavailable to Fletcher. And remember, he's a lawyer.

Carrey is, of course, less an actor than a nuclear reactor. His answer to even innocent questions is a lightning fugue of hugely exaggerated facial ticks, bodily contortions and subverbal bleatings. His genius is for orchestrating these infantile responses in ways that are unduplicative, unduplicatable and explosively subversive. Since the curse Max lays on Fletcher makes him his own worst enemy, Carrey is led into long, hilarious wrestling matches with himself.

As directed by Tom Shadyac, there's enough surrealism in Liar Liar to content all but the most exigent Carrey fans. But there's something worrisome about the film's attempts to socialize and sentimentalize the '90s' designated anarchist. It's wrong to push characters like Carrey's toward mainstream lovability. Danger, with just the slightest touch of lonely-guy geekiness, is his business. Maybe The Cable Guy was miscalculated, but one would rather see Carrey heading for those dark woods than toward sun-splashed suburbia and the cheerfully romantic ending of this film.

--By Richard Schickel