Big Comedians and Deep Performance.

I watched Punch Drunk Love again tonight. And as much as I though Billy Madison was kinda funny, and Magnolia was self-indulgent tripe, I think that this is a really great movie that never got it's due. And I think that Adam Sandler's performance was never given the respect it deserved. I just wanted to say that.
Just like Bill Murray was bad ass in Lost in Translation and Jim Carrey did an amazing, affecting (without affectation) job in The Truman Show, I think that silly comedians, really silly comedians like those three, do great jobs once they get into well written small dramas. The whole point is to stuff a large-but-thin (tragedy-wise) personality into a small-but-thick part. That's freaking gold.
When you stuff a large-but-thick personality (tragedy-wise) like Sean Penn into a small-but-thick roll, like most of the great ones are, then you end up with over acting...like most of Sean Penn's more lamentable roles (I'm looking at you I Am Sam).
This is the same phenomenon that makes Clint Eastwood a great filmmaker, he's a large but thin personality. He can encompass a dozen different thoughts, feelings, and ideas at the same time. Thus he incorporated Sean Penn in his larger vision and made that actor look good. Large but thick personalities get caught in their own depths--so they end up giving us one-sided, thin art. Think about Da Vinci, spread all over the place and never finishing most things, but the things he did finish are amazing. While, say, Ayn Rand, just wrote (essentially) the same thick novel over and over again.