Fellman's Movie Reviews

Red = Spoilers 

Ace Ventura: Pet Detective is a 1994 comedy starring Jim Carrey about a man who works as a private detective, not for people, but for animals. It’s explained within the first five minutes of the movie with the intro and the first action sequence that is still, to this day, one of the funniest intros to a movie I have ever seen. People say that the movie itself hasn’t aged well and that because of the jokes that are being made it’s against transgender people and homophobic and it’s offensive to the queer community. I say people are looking at things way too closely and not simply taking them for what they are. Jokes. Jokes that were made before our entire culture became way too PC for comedy to be any good anymore.  

What’s it about? We start with one of the best comedy intros, ever. Ace, moving down the street, dressed as a delivery man, smashing a package on various things for no particular reason. Until he gets to his destination and meets his customer who has a dog. He asks if he can pet him, and then quickly takes the forms the customer was signing and leaves. After Ace leaves, the customer yells at the dog to get away from the door, only to find out it’s been switched with a toy dog, and Ace has stolen the real one. Ace heads to his car, where the man soon follows him and smashes Ace’s windows with a baseball bat. After getting away, Ace returns the dog to its owner who repays Ace by “taking his pants off”. Ace then heads back to his apartment where he is confronted by his landlord, Mr. Shickadance, who warns him about having animals in his apartment. Ace is soon hired by Melissa Robinson to investigate the kidnapping of Snowflake, the Miami Dolphins football team mascot, who is kidnapped just weeks before the Superbowl. While investigating Snowflakes tank, Ace finds a rare amber stone, leading him to Ronald Camp. A collector of rare animals. He has Melissa act as his date to get him into a party at Camp’s house and finds a large tank with a shark in it and also sees camp has a ring with the same stone he found in Snowflake’s tank. He figures out the stone came from a 1984 AFC Championship Ring. So, he goes through every player on the 1984 team roster photo but finds every player’s ring intact. Roger Podacter, the Dolphins head of operations is suddenly suspected to have committed suicide, but Ace proves he is murdered. The investigation leads him to Ray Finkle, a disgraced former kicker for the 84’ Dolphins that was institutionalized after missing a kick in the Superbowl. Ace has Melissa commit him to a mental institution and discovers a box full of Finkle’s belongings. He soon realizes the Lieutenant of the police force is Finkle and calls Melissa to tell her that Dan Marino is in danger. He follows Einhorn/Finkle to a storage facility where Snowflake and Marino are being held hostage on Superbowl Sunday when all the police show up to reinforce Einhorn. Soon, Melissa shows up, holding Emilio hostage with a gun, buying Ace time to reveal Einhorn as Finkle.  

What’s good? It’s absurd. It’s goofy. It’s got your classic Jim Carrey being Jim Carrey moments. The things that he’s known for. The things that made him famous. A lot of them came from this movie.  

What’s bad? I’ll agree the scene where he goes all out when he finds out Einhorn is a man is a little over the top. But that’s the point of a joke. If it’s not over the top, it’s not a joke. If you’re not offending somebody, you’re not crossing any lines. The line is what makes it funny. That’s what all these PC people don’t realize. 

The acting? Everything’s good that I can see. Even the football players that had their cameos did a good job for the 30 seconds they were each on screen.  

The effects? There’s not really any effects in the movie. Ace’s car flips over at one point. But I think you have to do something like that manually. There was no CGI back in 1994 to do that.  

One of the best comedy intros. To this day, one of the most original and well written intros to a movie that I can remember. Easily one of my favorites. He just goes around smashing it on things for no reason. And he stands there in the elevator door, letting the door close on the box until he realizes the door is closing on it. Pure hilarity. I still laugh to this day. 

The guy didn’t think it was strange? That guy didn’t think it was strange that a delivery person showed up at his door with a BROKEN box and the insurance forms to fill out for the box that was already broken? That seems a little suspicious. 

He let her blow him. The reason Ace is always broke is because he’s probably letting women pay him in blowjobs like that lady he found that dog for. He really should’ve taken the reward. You can get a blowjob anywhere… 

How long has he been doing that? How long has he been grabbing leaves from that plant before he walks past his landlord’s window like that? That pile of leaves there is starting to get pretty big.  

How did he train all of those animals? How did he train all of those animals to hide like that? That’s gotta be an entire apartment full of animals there. Penguins can’t be easy to train.  

An unwashed jock strap. How bad would an unwashed jock strap smell after two years? I’m pretty sure the other players on the team would have something to say about that.  

He references the animal. He references cases by the animal, not by the people. Because the animals are more important to him. He remembered Martha Metz’ dog, not her.  

Do the cops not care? The cops see Ace drive like that and they just don’t care. Is he allowed to do that? How come? Why don’t they stop him? If they don’t like him so much, why do they let him get away with it? 

Why do regular cops let him work? If the regular cops dislike Ace so much, you’d think they would harass him and do all sorts of things to bother him. But he gets away with so much stuff. He drives like crazy and breaks all kinds of laws. How does he do it? 

He jumps over the guard rail. I like how he jumped over the guard rail just to travel three feet and jump back over. That’s a hilarious gag.  

The giant shark tank. What’s Camp doing with that giant shark tank, anyway? Why does he even have a shark? Who keeps a shark? Is it even legal to have a shark? Aren’t they endangered? 

The dog with rabies story. How many people has he told that “dog with rabies” story to, just so he could scare them like that? That seems like a pretty funny joke to do to somebody you just met. 

How did he notice Ray Finkle? How did he see Ray Finkle in the team photo from all the way across the room? His head would be the size of a dime and Ace was like 20 feet away.  

It was a good line to get Melissa to stay. It was a good line, telling her she was in danger and that she shouldn’t be alone. Then she asked what he thought she should do. That’s called “sweet talking”… 

He hit those cops. When he was chasing those guys that kidnapped Dan Marino, he literally hit four cops with his car and none of them even called it in. How does he get away with stuff like that? If they all hate him so much, you’d think they would be looking for the first excuse to take him down.  

Einhorn was immediately interested. Einhorn was immediately interested when Ace mentioned the name “Ray Finkle”. She was angry and yelling and then he said “Finkle” and her whole demeaner changed. A detective proving himself constantly aware of things should’ve picked up on something like that. 

Melissa could’ve picked any amount of time. She really could’ve given him as long as she wanted there. 20 minutes seemed like enough time. 15 would’ve been more appropriate, seeing as that’s how long halftime is for a football game… 

He goes all out. He really does go all out when he figures out Einhorn is a man. But I guess, that’s the point of a joke. To go over the top. To make it so absurd that people aren’t guessing about whether it’s a joke or not. Because, if they have to guess what a joke is, what is a joke? It should be obvious. It should be blatant.  

How did Jim Carrey do it all in one breath. That’s really impressive taking in all that air and saying all that stuff in one breath really fast. Like the lines at Ray Finkle’s front door. I wonder if they did that on the first take? That seems awfully difficult.  

Did Finkle make out with everyone? After Ace reveals Einhorn to be a man, everybody starts spitting. Even Snowflake starts splashing his snout under water. Did Einhorn make out with Snowflake, too? And did Einhorn literally make out with everybody on the police force? 

So, yeah. Go and see Ace Ventura: Pet Detective. One of my favorite movies, and one of the best comedies of the 90s, if not of all time. And as always, keep on watching, with a smile on your face…