Big Fat Liar

Directed by Shawn Levy, Big Fat Liar follows Frankie Muniz’s Jason Shepherd as he and his friend (Amanda Bynes’ Kaylee) decide to wage war against the arrogant movie producer (Paul Giamatti’s Marty Wolf) who stole Jason’s idea. Filmmaker Levy, armed with Dan Schneider’s screenplay, delivers a kid-oriented comedy that does, generally speaking, remain more watchable than one might’ve anticipated, and there’s little doubt that the decent-enough atmosphere is perpetuated by Levy’s briskly-paced modus operandi and a scene-stealing, completely compelling turn by Giamatti – with, in terms of the latter, the actor offering up a larger-than-life performance that goes a long way towards smoothing over the narrative’s less-than-spellbinding attributes. (Muniz and Bynes’ sitcom-level work, on the other hand, leans more towards grating than anything else.) And while the picture does contain handfuls of genuinely entertaining stretches, including (and especially) a fun digression detailing the dyeing of Giamatti’s character, Big Fat Liar‘s geared-to-small-children sensibilities paves the way for an overly frenetic third act that ensures the whole thing fizzles out rather demonstrably – with the final result a mostly passable endeavor that’s probably more tolerable than one had any right to expect.

**1/2 out of ****