When it comes to naming the best 12 months any actor in history has ever experienced, it’s hard not to include Jim Carrey’s 1994, which saw the rubber-faced funnyman go from a relative unknown to an A-list superstar after headlining Ace Ventura: Pet Detective, The Mask, and Dumb and Dumber in the same year.
It was the adaptation of the cult favorite Dark Horse comic book that fared best at the box office, though, with the reinvention of the darker source material into an irreverent comic caper precision-engineered to make the most of the leading man’s singular talents proving to be a masterstroke after it rocketed to $351 million at the box office.
Not only did it propel Carrey onto the upper rungs of the industry ladder, but The Mask also marked the feature film debut of Cameron Diaz, who would quickly go on to become one of the most popular and highest-paid stars in the industry in her own right. Plenty of superhero stories have made instant stars, but not many did it twice over in the space of only 101 minutes.
Just shy of its 30th anniversary, and The Mask has been riding a new wave of momentum on streaming, with FlixPatrol naming it as one of the most-watched titles on iTunes this weekend. The original holds up as a frantic and wondrously ludicrous adventure, but let’s not mention the follow-up that’s long since solidified an unwanted status as one of the worst sequels, comic book adaptations, and movies in general, all in one unmitigated disaster of a fell swoop.