jamesb-69559 As it has been pointed out,there are far too many negative opinions of this movie. Personally,I think its some of Keatons best work. To have to get into character for each clone and give them a distinct personality and have them interact with each other is amazingly difficult. People need to ease up on the poor reviews. This is a great film...yes GREAT....and should be seen as such.Has anyone ever seen the making of snip-it that is out for this movie? Keaton had to shoot each scene 3-4 times with the parts of the previously filmed clones playing on monitors off screen to get the interaction right. Once he was done shooting one scene with one character,he changed and came back and shot the scene all over again as another clone with a totally different personality. Its simply amazing in my opinion. Like I said,I think its one of Keaton's best films right along side the two Batman movies he did,Birdman,and,of course, Beetlejuice.

zetes Ramis' follow-up to Stuart Saves His Family was much more popular, but, I must say, it's a total dud. Michael Keaton plays a busy man who doesn't have enough time between his demanding construction job and his family (Andie MacDowell plays his wife). While on a job, he meets up with a scientist who offers to clone him. He now has a double, but soon that's not enough, so he gets a third. Then the two clones conspire and make a fourth. The three clones differ from the original Keaton quite a bit. The first time, it makes some sense. 2 is a bit more cynical, knowing that he's the clone who has to work. 3, for some reason, is gay. 4, since he's a clone of a clone, is a daffy moron. So Keaton is basically giving four performances here, so he has a lot of opportunity to show his acting chops. Unfortunately, by 1996, Keaton had pretty much hit rock-bottom, and he does little but mug throughout the movie. It doesn't help that the script flat-out sucks. No other actor has anything else to do, so it's all up to Keaton and he flops.

vchimpanzee Doug is having a hard time getting everything done. He is being pressured to do more at the construction business he works for, as well as by his wife Laura who wants him to spend time with children Zack and Jennifer. Laura wants to return to her career, as a woman she started out with has been promoted and wants Laura to replace her. But he may have the solution: one of the residents of a development he is supervising has perfected cloning. In fact, it was his clone who signed a deal with Doug's company.So Doug decides to go for it. A second Doug is created, with all his memories. Problem solved! He just has to hide the second Doug in the guest house. The second Doug will go to work while original Doug spends time with the family and takes time for himself--playing golf, for example.You know where this is going. One clone can't do it all. So another one is needed. And possibly another. And each one creates its own kind of chaos. For example, one Doug can make Laura happy (no, not that way, although ...) at home better than original Doug can. And, unfortunately, it's not all funny. That's fine, because there are lessons to be learned and the lead actors are so good I'm willing to see them do anything.Michael Keaton does a very good job playing four distinct characters: Steve (original Doug), Lance (the first clone, a macho pig), Rico (the sensitive and effeminate second clone), and Lenny (because he is a copy of a copy, he is "special").Andie MacDowell is very funny in a series of scenes that begins with her in a sexy nightie and ends with her in just a pajama top.When more than one Doug is on screen, it really looks as if both or all are there. I wasn't distracted by trying to figure out how they did it. I have a small TV, though. It's a hilarious and rewarding effort.

sddavis63 This is not the best comedy ever made, but in all fairness I have to say that I've sat through more than a few comedies and never even cracked a smile. This one on a handful of occasions actually had me laughing out loud, so for that reason alone I have to say it's pretty solid. Michael Keaton is what makes this work so well. It's not just because he's the star - it's that he stars in four roles. It's not a costume comedy, though, which makes his performance all the better. He essentially plays the same character with tweaks and variations to differentiate between them, and he pulls it off brilliantly. Each character is a character of his own, and even the interactions between the characters he plays are pulled off flawlessly so that everything is very natural.The story is tailor made for a comedy revolving around mistaken identity. Keaton's basic character is Doug Kinney, an overworked contractor who's finding that he doesn't have time to keep everything in his life in balance. Hoping for a miracle to help keep his life together he finds himself doing some work for a geneticist who's discovered the secret of "cloning" humans. It's not scientific - the "clones" come out as exact physical replicas rather than as newborn babies with identical genetic material to the original - but this is a comedy, so who cares! It works! Starting with one clone (named, simply, "2") Doug finds that even one copy isn't enough, so he makes another (named, appropriately, "3.") 2 and 3 are completely different from Doug and polar opposites from each other. 2 is a macho, take charge type who happily takes over the contracting business but chafes about having to stay out of sight when he'd much rather be picking up women, while 3 is an effeminate, stay at home type who loves cooking and cleaning. Eventually, 2 and 3 find themselves over-burdened, and they create another clone (named - guess what - "4.") except that 4 is a copy of copy and so, therefore, imperfect, for lack of a better way to put it. Intended to make Doug's life easier, all these 3 clones do is introduce increasing chaos, and at times it is hilarious.Really the only other cast member of note is Andie MacDowell (who teams again with director Harold Ramis as she did in "Groundhog Day") as Doug's increasingly confused wife Laura. Unfortunately, the movie revolves so completely around Doug and the clones that MacDowell, while she was good enough and as always quite lovely, seemed to fade into the background more often than not, so that her talents were generally underused. She's more impressive opposite Bill Murray in "Groundhog Day" than she is here, but that's more a result of the type of movie and the role that it asked of her rather than any deficiency in her performance.This is almost two hours long - which might be a little bit too much for this type of silly comedy. It gets to that length perhaps by trying to introduce too much "drama" (if you will) in the last while about Doug and Laura's faltering marriage. Still, it's a funny movie, and Keaton's performance is worth watching. (7/10)