To burst or not to burst this movie's bubble? That is the question.
I liked it, I really did. Will everyone like it? No, not even most people, or a lot of people.
There will only be a handful of people who enjoy Bubble Boy, from first-time director Blair Hayes II.
The Bubble Boy, named Jimmy, is played by Jake Gyllenhaal (October Sky), who makes good as a sheltered child destined to spend his life trapped in a bubble because his body is unable to make immunities. Any little germ could kill him.
Gyllenhaal is the bright spot in this twisted adventure-comedy. He taps some of the childhood humor and delivery that Adam Sandler was able to use in his earlier movies Billy Madison and Happy Gilmore.
Jimmy is cared for by his over-protective mother, played by Swoosie Kurtz. Mrs. Livingston manages to convince her son that the world out there is a terrible place. She teaches him Bible stories and lets him watch just one television station. She even convinces her son that Chloe, the pretty girl next door is actually a whore.
Chloe, feeling sorry for the cute boy in the bubble who watches her from his window, befriends Jimmy, and he falls in love with her.
Eventually the distance that the thin little bubble puts between their feelings for each other convinces Chloe to move on and marry the jerk whom she has been dating.
Jimmy must now find a way to go cross-country and stop the wedding.
Along the way, the Bubble Boy encounters a slew of freaks and fruit-loops far more disturbed and with far worse problems than his own. He gets mixed in with a freak side-show circus run by Vern Troyer (Austin Powers' Mini-Me). He confuses some country bumpkins and blows up their hang-out, and he offends a Middle-Eastern ice-cream man.
This cast of rejects adds a few laughs, but ultimately you find yourself wishing that Jimmy could ditch these guys and just continue the journey on his own. His charisma draws your eyes back to him every time.
Marley Shelton (Valentine) plays Chloe and even her beauty isn't enough to cover-up a somewhat flat performance. Her screen time is usually shared with a mullet- wearing boyfriend you love to hate. You will pay more attention to hating him than you will to loving Chloe.
Many of the jokes are sophomoric in nature. Along the way Jimmy discovers his sexuality, deals with death and learns the truth about religion.
You really won't find anything here that you won't find in American Pie, Blast from the Past or Encino Man. It's a coming-of-age comedy filled with slap-stick humor and cheap, crude jokes. If you like those two things, you may like Bubble Boy. Then again, you might not.
I can't make any promises on that point, but I will promise you this — you will leave the theater being very thankful just for being normal. Maybe, just maybe, that was the reason this movie was made.
Hey, don't knock me for trying to be positive.
Movie Grade: C
PG-13, 74 minutes
