On Demand Weekly

On Demand Weekly provides new movie reviews of hot movies on demand from the POV of watching from the comfort of your home. I AM.

I AM
Part of the Solution or Part of the Problem
By Kris Scheifele

The 'I am' in this film's title is not a twist on the Cartesian cogito ergo sum. I AM gets its name from a response to a question posed to G.K. Chesterton, a British writer who died in 1936. The London Times asked him to write an essay in response to the question, "What is wrong with the world?" Chesterton's essay was brief; he wrote, "I am." This documentary asks the same question, and the one that logically follows, "What can we do about it?" By posing these questions, Tom Shadyac, I AM's director, enters the conversation about competition, material excess, and separation. He also finds what's right with the world — cooperative community, conservation, and compassion.

This is Shadyac's debut as a documentarian, but you may know him from a few little ditties like ACE VENTURA: PET DETECTIVE and THE NUTTY PROFESSOR. Some years back, Shadyac's blind feasting on comedy gold's robust bounty was interrupted by an accident which left him with post-concussion syndrome. The months of physical and emotional suffering made him notice some things outside his Hollywood bubble. Recuperating at home he says, "I saw AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH again. I see more news about the war in Iraq and I see poverty and I keep thinking that these are not the problems, there's a poison underneath." Shadyac also noticed that all his achievements and monetary success had not brought him happiness. (What's that? Money can't buy happiness?) The way he describes it, his illness forever shifted his priorities and the role he wanted to play in life.

It's hard to be critical of a film with high-minded aims, especially when it's blessed by Oprah. However, despite Shadyac's claim that the film is his story, it really isn't. It's another doc dealing in generalities, albeit noble ones. The story of Shadyac's transformation bookends the film: we get a brief glimpse of the conditions which inspired the film, and at the end, we find out that he traded in his mansion and all his high-end crap for modest digs in a mobile home community and biking to work.