Critic Reviews

John Candy: I Like Me is a beautiful love letter to the comedian.

The assessment of Candy’s life and legacy provides ample cause for laughter while also provoking plenty of tears.

This carefully crafted documentary is more focused on telling a particularly curated story about Candy than any incisive or thought-provoking portrayal.

Through the amazing array of talking heads Hanks assembles to share their relationship to Candy, we are left with the distinct impression that there just wasn't anyone else like John. A grand man indeed, in a grand documentary to suit him.

You’re astonished to see how fully actualized Candy was as a performer in his short time, but you’re also left with the heartbreak of all that was left unrealized by his untimely passing.

Friends, acquaintances and fans still get choked up when the subject of the late Canadian comic wonder John Candy comes up.

Is this moving-picture love letter overly sentimental, sloppy to a fault, and slightly more affectionate toward its posthumous subject than a basket of puppies high on laughing gas? Yes. Does that mean that, in its own way, it perfectly mirrors Candy’s own tendency to overdo it and still make you like him, really, really like him? Also yes.

Hanks’ doc mostly shows how great it must have been to know John Candy when he was alive, although Conan O’Brien does a nice job of contextualizing how he inspired others. Amid all that adulation, Hanks might have scrapped the title “I Like Me” and called the movie “Everybody Likes Candy” instead.

If you already loved John Candy, this doc will make you love him even more. If you were born after his time, it will be a lovely introduction. Still, the way the doc lingers on its unabashed celebration of Candy’s life and work yet rushes through its brief examination of his psyche prevents it from being a total knockout.

John Candy: I Like Me, made with the cooperation of Candy’s children and his wife, feels like a tale told by friends, but friends who are less interested in promoting idolatry than in showing you why they loved the man.