The Good

These movies are honest to goodness comic gems.

The Bad

Overall, it seems that a set like this should contain more Bonus Features.

This set provides consumers with Ace Ventura: Pet Detective and Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls in the Ace Ventura Deluxe Double Feature. While describing these films might be redundant, I mean even if you've never heard of them before you can probably figure out what they are about just by their titles. Jim Carrey stars as the indomitable Ace Ventura. He is a gumshoe unlike any other that seems to solve his cases simply by virtue of the fact that he is the only one on them. In Ace Ventura: Pet Detective, he is on the case of the Miami Dolphins missing mascot, and in Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls believe it or not our fearless detective heads to Africa when a bat goes missing.

Filled with infantile humor, gross jokes, farts, screwball comedy, and pretty much anything else Jim Carrey was able to throw in there, Ace Ventura Deluxe Double Feature provides the kind of comedy that today is standard. However, at that time with Pulp Fiction on the scene, that film and Ace Ventura: Pet Detective pushed boundaries beyond belief.

Features

Commentary Track

Tom Shadyac offers a real cool commentary track on this disc. It's so nice to hear somebody talk about filmmaking, and they remove all the pretense and just speak honestly from their hearts. He discusses how he edited the movie and was just merciless trying to get the best parts in. I really appreciated how he simply broke down making a comedy, and how he doesn't belabor too many points. In a weird way, I think he has the ability to turn the kind of movies he makes into their own art form. Sure, they may not ever be part of the Janus Films Collection, but can you tell me many money making films that that were?

Cartoons from Ace Ventura: The Animated Series

Video

Aspect Ratio - 1.85:1. Apparently, up until this release Ace Ventura: Pet Detective had never been available in this format before. Why that is, or more importantly, why that would matter to someone, is beyond me, but you can rejoice folks because it's finally here. I thought both of these films looked good, but I don't know that they can really be judged that harshly because films like this don't really look like anything. You don't often watch comedies and tell by the way they look, "Oh, that person made them." These are the rare films where the subject matter is king and through that we tell who created the films.

Audio

Dolby Digital 5.1. The audio for these discs is fine. I have to be honest, and this is sort of off the audio subject, but I practically OD'd on the Ace Ventura catch phrases. How many times can one hear "All righty thennn..." before they want to jump out the window? Again, like I said about the images above, one doesn't watch a movie like this to get some amazing audio experience. We want to both hear and see the jokes and in that regard this set gets flying colors.

Package

This cover has an "in your face" hand presenting an ID with Ace Venture on it. It also lists out the two films in this set. Pretty simple stuff and if I didn't know any better I would call this release another double dip. The back features some shots from the movie, a description of the films, a Special Features listing, and system specs. I was confused when I first got this simply because it seems like in this day and age of "Deluxe Editions," the consumer would get some merchandise that would actually seem "Deluxe." While the content is good, this feels more like a rerelease than something that's going to knock somebody's block off.

Final Word

I find it interesting what is happening to Jim Carrey. It's like he is being dressed down yet his films have hit a lot more than they've missed. Even when he's missed, they haven't been that big of a disaster. I guess the argument could be made that he could certainly take a pay cut (he's been making $20 million a picture for how long now?), but if a studio is willing to pay him or Tom Cruise or any actor that kind of money, you better believe that they are recouping a lot more than that. So while someone like Jim Carrey is certainly getting well in regards to what he is paid, think of all the other money he isn't seeing. And lets be honest, for his films he is legitimately the star. We're not talking about a genre like horror which doesn't really matter that much, as long as you tell a good, scary story.

I bring this up because after going through this set, I think maybe some of the execs that are coming after him, would do well to obtain a copy of the Ace Ventura Deluxe Double Feature. He didn't become the $20 million dollar man for nothing, guys.

Ace Ventura: Pet Detective was released .