#1: Ace Ventura: Pet Detective
First of all, I liked how I titled this, because there seems to be an excess of colons. I'm a fan...of? Punctuation!
Second of all, before we get into the mini-review, let us all bask in the glory of Tone Loc.
Ace Ventura is undoubtedly the best film of Tone Loc and Dan Marino's long and storied acting careers. But beyond that, Courtney Cox (just barely) tops her performance in this video for the Boss:
Anyway, if you were a tween in 1994, especially in the Middle West of these United States (and, probably, Canada), you were basically honor-bound to love Ace Ventura. Rewatching it tonight for the who-knows-how-many-th time, I'm not sure if I still love it because it holds up (I swear it does) or because the film is so engrained in my consciousness from quoting and re-quoting it for the last (almost!) 20 years that it is funny by default. Things that stick out today that weren't so obvious to my younger, less boring self, are:
(1) How sexually coarse the movie is: Ace goes to third base with the very grateful owner of a stolen pup in like the first scene; there is a love scene in which Ace (shamefully) can only make it happen three (3) times; and, of course, we see Jim Carrey's pasty white ass in the Crying Game scene. I swear to G-D (wait, I'm not Jewish) this all passed over my head for a long time.
(2) How convoluted Finkle's plot is: there's got to be a simpler way to get back at Dan Marino than posing as a woman for a number of years, carefully and painfully climbing the ladder at Miami PD to get into a position in which he can really stick to Marino good...speaking of which...
(3) How questionable the gender politics are: The Crying Game scene and everyone's disgust at realizing "Einhorn is Finkle! Finkle is Einhorn!" were hilarious to my 12 year old self. More than a decade later, those jokes fall more than a little flat. However, I'll let it pass on the good faith assumption that the joke isn't just that a boy kissing a boy is inherently gross but that a boy kissing a boy he thinks is a girl is disappointing and therefore gross. Safely justified, I can now enjoy the movie without reservation. Right? Right?
(4) How awesome Jim Carrey's performance is: Amelia, the acting teacher, made a great point tonight while watching this movie. She's not a big fan of Jim Carrey generally, but noted that his performance is a great example of how a character can work if you fully commit to your choices. Case in point, see this scene:
Anyway, this is an obvious KEEPER for both of us.
Full Disclosure: My fantasy team this year was named LACES OUT. Mm, shaped like little footballs.
#2: Adaptation
After Ace, we flipped to ESPN only to see a rout in progress. I decided we must therefore press on with this project and watch Adaptation. Amelia sighed. (Remember our Rules, Constant Reader).
Twenty minutes or so into a film filled with great performances by Chris Cooper, Meryl Streep, and Nicolas Cage (remember when he made good movies?), however, I noticed a change in attitude. Our erstwhile acting teacher was interested! Laughing, even!
To be honest, I was surprised at my interest in rewatching this as well. Charlie Kaufman is a terrific writer, to be sure, but his movies (save, perhaps, Being John Malkovich), don't easily lend themselves to rewatchability, which is the crucial metric for Movies You Must Own.
However, as someone who (occasionally) fancies himself a writer and (truly) writes for a living as an attorney, there's something about Adaptation that rings so true and direct that the film can't be denied. The ingenious, though admittedly self-indulgent, set-up that Charlie Kaufman (Cage) must write a film adaptation of The Orchid Thief by Susan Orlean (Streep) allows the Real Charlie Kaufman to explore why writers write and the obstacles to translating a real, human experience for mass consumption.
Some of my favorite scenes involve Cage, playing both Charlie and his hack (nonexistent) twin brother Donald Kaufman, debating the finer points of writing. Charlie is trying to write a movie about flowers and the entire human experience and Donald is writing a serial killer movie where (TWIST!) the killer is not only also the cop chasing him but also the girl being held hostage. In an apparently spoiler-unaware state of mind, Donald unironically names his film "The 3."
Donald represents that hackneyed impulse living within every writer to go for the easy out and the sexy twist and Charlie represents the PURE ARTIST(C) that must only write what his heart tells him...if it can ever speak up. The truly clever and remarkable thing about Adaptation is how it shows (in a ridiculous, yet thrilling final third act) that you occasionally have to be a hack to tell and/or finish a story and that being a pure artist may not get you so far as you think (see Synecdoche, New York, for more on this theme, I think).
Nothing at all makes sense but everything does, just like with most Kaufman movies. I vote KEEPER. Amelia, who fell asleep at some point - I blame dealing with a sick 3 year old and a newborn all day, not the movie - asked what happened when she woke up, which I take as a KEEPER as well.
So, Day 1 done, and 2 KEEPERS.
Next in the queue: Adventures in Babysitting.
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