"The Mask" Surprisingly Boring

 

    Look I want to enjoy Jim Carrey, I really do. After all, when have I ever passed up on the opportunity to support my fellow Canadians? It's just, this film is supposed to be a comedy film, and absolutely none of it lands for me. Especially considering the age of this film, and just generally how lackluster the production can seem at times, if the comedy isn't hitting, then frankly this film has very little to offer to me in general. I mean I suppose that explains why I may or may not have been on my phone for large portions of the film when I watched it a couple years ago, I had just hoped that this time around I would actually find something to enjoy about it.

    Look, plot isn't everything when it comes to comedy movies. In fact, subverting expectations and making things nonsensical is part of the appeal of comedy movies. It's just that when it comes to this movie, they made the plot stupid, but not in a way I'd enjoy. And by far, the clearest example of this would be Milo, the dog of protagonist, Stanley Ipkiss. Look, I would not say I'm part of the population that absolutely hates dogs, but when it comes to this one dog it's just too much. Tell me why the movie dedicated a whole minutes-long scene to Milo struggling to jump an improbable height to help break Jim Carrey out of jail? Then tell me why he once again becomes instrumental in ensuring that Dorian loses? There's just too much of this dog, and for a movie that somehow has a fantastical character imbued with powers limited only by the imagination of the cartoon-addled main character, a regular dog somehow became an integral part of the story.

    This would all be fine, if just for a second, this movie was actually funny. I don't know if it was the CGI that has aged pretty poorly, just the general perversion of the mask persona, or the fact that slapstick comedy does not simply work on me, but this movie was so unfunny to me. And that's my main gripe with this film. If the comedy isn't there, then the lack of glue holding everything else together just becomes that much more apparent. Like what's up with Stanley Ipkiss and his love life? I didn't really get it. You start with him being too scared to even stand up to random co-workers, then him finding a "super hot" girlfriend in Tina, then there's Peggy, who was supposed to sort of be there to help start the "you don't need to be anything different than you already are" moral. But then Peggy turns out to be evil and Tina who was initially impressed by him being the mask ends up with him in the end? I don't know I just felt like there were too many different love interests, and that aspect of the movie definitely could have been tightened so that the message about Stanley not actually needing the mask was strengthened.

Final Score: 50/100

    I'd write another paragraph for this movie but the truth is I don't think it'd add much to this film. The more I write about it the more tempted I am to lower my score. I just assume it's one of those films that's not for me. I mean it wasn't grating, it just wasn't funny, and for a movie that's not even 2 hours long it felt oddly long to both me and my sister.  On a side note what the hell was up with the weird corner cutting they did? Like why did half of the scenes take place inside the same bar, and why did they not even bother giving Dorian a semi-realistic mask? Like his neck is super thick and he has a super stereotypical evil bad guy voice it's hilariously low-budget, even for this movie.

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