phew , what a mess ! 
for his fifth collaboration with director rich- ard donner ( lethal weapon i-iii , maverick ) , mel gibson plays a motormouth , maybe mentally ill new york city cabbie , jerry , whose wild conspiracy theories are all but ignored by alice ( julia roberts , acting all serious ) , the justice department employee that he has a crush on . 
she not interested , but another person is : a cia psychiatrist ( patrick stewart ) who promptly kidnaps him . 
is one of jerry's conjectures correct ? 
 * is * the metal strip in the new $100 bill being used to track your movements ? 
is oliver stone still alive , because he cut a deal with george bush to spread * dis * information ? 
is this movie really about * any * of the crazed cabbie's theories ? 
no , no , and no . 
as it turns out , there's some other nonsense going on here , involving and revolving around jerry's background . 
 ( hint : pay attention to an early scene where jerry blacks out and flashes back , in quick succession , to images of an interrogation room , hypodermic needles , and ms . roberts herself . ) 
the * initial * premise is pretty good and is played , for a while , at a delightfully dizzying clip . 
mel is wider-open that we've ever seen him and , if his character's relationship with roberts' initially strains credibility , their combined star power is blissfully intoxicating . 
 ( the highest wattage of the summer , perhaps ? ) 
even when the plot contrivances begin to intrude , the two remain a randy dandy screen pair . 
there's a great scene in jerry's fortress , er , apartment , with alice trying to act casual as her hyperactive host tries to remember the combination to a locked coffee bean container . 
 ( which he stores in another locked con- tainer , his fridge . ) 
other hilarious moments , of which there are many , include a trio of memorable convention-breakers , where alice ditches a tail , jerry cold-cocks someone , and , later , eludes a foot pursuit , each in a uproariously unexpected fashion . 
 ( that's donner's own ladyhawke playing in the theater , btw . ) 
let's see , other pleasures include . . . 
a brilliant title sequence , a jazzy score from carter burwell , and the worth-paying-to-see sight of roberts pumping lead into one bad guy and slamming another's head into a wall . 
oh , pretty woman ! 
getting to the latter , however , requires slogging through an increasingly overburdened and ultimately unappealing story . 
the last hour of conspiracy theory devolves from tolerable to torturous to almost unwatchable . 
more stuff happens of the stupid shit variety than is worth mentioning here , except , perhaps , for a late sequence that has alice locating jerry in an abandoned wing of a mental hospital by hearing his voice carrying through the air ducts . 
and here i thought it was wabbit season . 
good god , who rewrites these movies ? 
and do they arrive in nondescript black vehicles ?