Final ‘Answer Man’

If Jeff Daniels is forever typecast as an affable idiot because of Dumb & Dumber, as brilliant as that performance was, it wasn’t worth it. Daniels has been superb in the dramatic roles he’s taken since, from The Hours, to The Lookout to The Squid and the Whale. And in theaters Friday is The Answer Man. Daniels stars as the renowned but reclusive author of a best-selling spiritual self-help book called Me and God. Everyone wants something from him or at least to meet him, but few do until a rehabbing bookstore clerk and a neurotic single mother discover his secret identity and pursue him for solutions to their many problems. However, they quickly realize his life is just as messy as theirs. Lauren Graham, Lou Taylor Pucci and Olivia Thirlby co-star. Rated R.