Review of Ace Ventura: Pet Detective (1994) by Kai82 — 29 Mar 2021

A typical good Jim Carrey movie that would never been greenlighted today anymore. You get what you expect: A great comedy experience with a hilariously good Jim Carrey. He has its own style that is not for everyone but really entertaining for many.

He was maybe to often typecast with this in his career and nearly vanished until he saved his career with his exceptional performance as Dr. Robotnik in the Sonic movie (which I recommend by the way).

This movie started a franchise with 3 movies (1 unknown TV adaptation which I just recently discovered and have yet to watch) and an animated TV series (vanished quickly and I know only a few episodes).

Back to the movie: The title explains already a lot. Ace Ventura is a pet detective who saves / searches missing animals. He is an animal rights activists and critical of humans that threat animals poorly.

He is Jim Carrey role eccentric, socially unadapted and his methods are unordinary (but successful). He is hired when the dolphin mascot of the Miami Dolphins is kidnapped shortly before the Super Bowl.

For those who are not that much invested in sports I should point out that many athletes are superstitious and things like this have huge impacts on motivation and mental attitude. Just research the “Curse of Billy Goat” for example;-).

With this the hilarious detective comedy starts. It is a solid story for a comedy. However the make or break point is Jim Carrey’s performance. He is often dividing the audience. Some say he is hilariously funny and the highlight of the movies while others find him annoying and would rate his movies as trash.

So this is what you must find out for yourself. For me I enjoy Jim Carrey mostly. There are some exceptions like Cable Guy and small missteps elsewhere. In this franchise I enjoy him as Ace Ventura as most jokes work.

This is a fitting transition to the actors / characters, I already explained that Jim Carrey’s performance depends on your own taste of comedy. He is either brilliant or awful for you (Strangely I have not found people in the middle-ground yet).

Just as sidenote: He often gets positive and negative awards or nominations for the same movie. Then we have Courteney Cox as Melissa Robinson. She gives a good performance but has not that many screentime.

Sean Young as Lois Einhorn is a movie character that would get the film canceled today. Wont say why because of spoilers. The rest of the cast works well but it is a Jim Carrey movie so his hilarious performance outshines their performance somewhat.

Special mention for Dan Marino as himself. He is one of the football quarterbacks that is universally acclaimed, set records but sadly never won a Super Bowl. I think I don't need to talk about visuals or soundtrack here.

Overall this was an enjoyable ride and I can recommend the movie if you like Jim Carry. I will however say the sequel is better. If you dislike Jim Carrey’s humor / style I would advice to stay away from this movie and possibly from all his movies as it is not suited for you.