I was able to watch this on HULU streaming movies.I had seen this years ago and remember that I enjoyed it, so was anxious to see it again. Today the benign tropical storm Cindy passed through so it was a good day to stay inside. While I remembered the broad gist of the story and some funny complications most of it was pretty fresh to me.Michael Keaton is Doug Kinney working for a big building contractor in Los Angeles. He has a wife and two kids, loves his family, but more and more finds that he doesn't have enough time for everything he wants and needs to do. A scientist, a geneticist, observes Doug's frustration at a job side, pulls him aside, and introduces him to his #2. An exact clone, a procedure the geneticist has pretty much perfected over the years.Out of options Doug agrees to have an exact clone made of himself, complete with all memories. This clone has an additional advantage, he is just a bit more assertive and confident than Doug and immediately starts to be more effective on the job.Soon Doug takes on many other activities while his #2 is working the main job but Doug still runs short of time. So he has another clone made. Number 3 is a bit different also, he is more sensitive, more domestic, with some effeminate characteristics. All playing on the idea that, much like making Xerox copies, each one is a bit different from the original.Then the big surprise comes when one of the clones makes a clone of himself and a big deviation occurs, #4 is very goofy and strange in a number of ways, #2 and #3 begin to affectionately call him "Rainman." Andie MacDowell is really good as the wife, Laura. But the main reason to see this is the acting of Keaton. He has to play 4 distinctly different roles and he does it masterfully. SPOILERS: All this causes friction between Doug and Laura, disappointed she moves away for a while, not knowing she had been dealing with 4 different Dougs. In her absence the 4 Dougs do all the home renovations he had promised her, and he wins her back. In the end Doug #1 gives the other three a car and they take off East, ending up in Miami, Laura never finds out about them.

Let me start with the obvious: this film is of it's time. It's slight, whimsical, wish-fulfillment fun. There is no great need to place too much faith in the science, which in fact is part of the fun also. Who would've thought that cloning might be like photocopying, crossed with vacu-forming? Basically Michael plays an over worked construction executive who is trying to balance work and his family. He clones himself when me meets some weird scientist who explains it all. Then everything pretty much gets obvious from there. Michael Keaton does very good work presenting very different personas, well distinguished from each other, while retaining their sources in the original character's makeup. Andy McDowell's just along for the ride, but fills her role well. It's really an adult comedy, Keaton is very good at the sharp dialogue and asides, a child might be mystified by much of what passed, while laughing uproariously at the visual humour.This is thin material, the humor growing mostly from mistaken identities. But Keaton and MacDowell have marriage problems to work through, which they do with only minor histrionics. As a "serious" look at marriage problems, it's almost believable. And one of the jokes has a punchline that's nearly as good as the infamous one in "The Thin Man". This is a comedy and it will succeed at making you laugh. The story and content is a bit deeper than the average comedy so it has dramatic tones here and there, but never without Keaton's trademark goofiness. To change anything in this movie would leave it less funny, too dramatic, or both. It is perfect the way it is - clean, simple, funny and endearing.Overall rating: 8 out of 10.

Multiplicity (1996): Dir: Harold Ramis / Cast: Michael Keaton, Andie MacDowell, Harris Yulin, Eugene Levy, Richard Masur: Great concept marred by routine storytelling. It regards our crowded schedules and less time spent on what matters. Michael Keaton plays Doug Kenney who allows a cloning procedure to take place and is soon facing Doug 2. He is shacked up in the garage where everything depends on his wife not finding out. Now she can return to work but once the demands become too much then Doug 3 is brought in. Doug 3's distinction is that he is overly sensitive. This will lead to Doug 4 when a clone decides to clone. This results in a distorted mental stability. Fun concept becomes predictable and unsatisfactory with his wife never knowing even after spending a long night with the clones. Directed by Harold Ramis who has fun with the material but clearly he has made superior comedies such as Caddyshack and National Lampoon's Vacation. Keaton is remarkable as all four clones who each have different personalities, and Andie MacDowell is superb as his wife, bewildered at the odd behaviours of her supposed husband. Flat supporting roles featuring Harris Yulin as the engineer behind the cloning, and Eugene Levy who screws up a paving job in an early scene. Multiple missed opportunities with a theme regarding priority. Score: 6 / 10

Ever since the box office success of "Groundhog Day", director Harold Ramis has never looked better and even went further when he paired Robert De Niro and Billy Crystal in the 1999 classic "Analyze This". In his early film career, he started out at mid-range, even as an actor (though he was excellent in "Ghostbusters"). Before then Ramis depended on getting approval with his audience with slapstick comedies to please the Hollywood masses. "Caddyshack" sort of stood out above the rest, but it was still an overrated film considering the more fresher work he's done later in his career."Multiplicity" stars Michael Keaton as a construction foreman named Doug Kinney who feels overloaded in his work with very little appreciation from the people surrounding him. Feeling like he's at the end of his rope, he conjures up a crazy solution. By irony, while he is supervising a facility that specializes in cloning techniques, he decides that this might actually work out the kinks of multi-tasking work and family life. Once the doctor gives him the green light to start cloning, a duplicate emerges. However, the clones were not as equal in intelligence as Doug had hoped for. So he kept making more duplicates of himself and now, Doug finds himself in a more deeper predicament than he was before. The comical notion emerges on how Doug is going to fix the messes he got himself.in. Within each clone, they eventually start to pick up on his mental characteristics and it in a way exhibits our ways of the trials and tribulations in dealing with work and family life and we realize that there will never be any shortcuts and that we must take everything one day at a time.Many reviews put this movie down because it mainly lacks in anything remotely logical. I have no reason to argue about that analogy at all. But you have to understand that this is just a comedy that doesn't have to be plausible in any way. But the overall concept of this comedy has a very deep effect about life itself and the subtle dramatic undertones does indeed garner much for the audience to think about when you're in a similar situation that Doug is facing in his life. However, Keaton's silly humor will likely keep you entertained at the same time. And this is where we see the improvements that Ramis has accomplished as a director and writer. He doesn't have to depend on having lazy jerks screwing with every woman they lay eyes on, or people doing disgusting bodily functions like farting and burping just get the viewers attention. And though there is very little in terms of content. Your kids won't have to worry about stuff like nudity or gratuitous course language. If there were changes made, it wouldn't be for the better. It might come come off as too goofy or too dramatic or maybe even a little bit of both. Sometimes things are left best just the way it is, and "Multiplicity" is one of those movies.