Remember when celebrity biopics were relegated to the realm of TV movies? Now they’ve become a box office staple. On any given week, it’s virtually impossible to set foot in a multiplex without having at least one celebrity impersonator from which to choose. Evangelical bamboozler Jim Bakker (Andrew Garfield) never saw his wife without her makeup. No one did. The soap or cold cream has yet to be invented that could wipe clean the face of Tammy Faye Bakker (Jessica Chastain), a painted-woman with mascara and eyebrows permanently inked by a tattooist's needle. The line between camp and credibility is a hard one not to blur, so director Michael Showalter (The Baxter, Hello, My Name is Doris() and his three screenwriters don’t bother trying. According to this remake of the superior documentary by the same name, the blithe Bakkers were the same on screen and off. In the event this highly unlikely premise were true, it was the filmmakers’ task to devise a manner in which to dramatize their cartoon swindlers. They didn’t. (2021) — Scott Marks
This movie is not currently in theaters.