Review of Multiplicity (1996) by Stuart K — 30 Dec 2012

Directed by Harold Ramis, who had just come off the critical and financial success of Groundhog Day (1993), he was offered this film based on a short story written by his friend Chris Miller, who he'd written National Lampoon's Animal House (1978) with.

This is a good concept for a comedy, but despite a very game lead, parts of it feel a bit forced, and the comedy is forced as well, which is a shame. Los Angeles construction worker Doug Kinney (Michael Keaton) is stretched between his family and work, the latter is taking up too much of his time, and he can't find time for him or his wife Laura (Andie MacDowell).

Frustated, he finds help in an unusual answer from Dr. Leeds (Harris Yulin), a maverick scientist who has been working on cloning, and Dr. Leeds makes a perfect clone of Doug. The plan is one does the construction work, one spends time with the family, but misunderstandings get in the way, and nothing is simple.

Then, the second clone makes another clone when he finds it's too much hard work being with the family, and then another clone is made to Doug's horror. It's great to see 4 Michael Keaton sharing the screen with one another, taking the twinning effects of Dead Ringers (1988) to a whole new level.

But, it suffered from having too many screenwriters, and somethings got lost in the story telling, the staging feels off.