Son of the Mask

Son of the Mask (Director: Lawrence Guterman)

Guterman's notable previous entry is Cats & Dogs.

Do you like the soothing sounds of babies crying? Here's a movie with that in spades! Also, do you like it when babies look like Ed Asner and creep you out? It has that, too! Son of the Mask becomes the 2nd entry from New Line Cinema to attempt to capitalize on an earlier Jim Carrey vehicle (the awful Dumb & Dumberer being the 1st. The link takes you to a one-line review of it in the middle of a lot of other reviews) without Jim Carrey and the attitude he brought to those 1994 comedies. This movie is PG. It's made for kids. What's wrong with that? The first was a PG-13 vehicle, and while it wasn't the best movie in the world, it at least was watchable due to Carrey's portrayal of the mischief-making Mask. I know it was long rumored after those films that Carrey would be doing the sequels, but I think he was focused on doing different things.

The fun of the original Mask was seeing a down-on-his-luck guy become instantly popular by transforming into an over-extroverted, supernatural force. It was Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde on speed. This movie strips all of that away. Our main character, Tim Avery (Jamie Kennedy. The name of Avery, I'm sure, is in reference to Tex Avery, the man behind numerous Merrie Melodies/Looney Tunes features and generally credited with the creation of the character of Bugs Bunny and the line, "What's up, doc?" before it became Mel Blanc's to own), is a struggling animator who just wants to get his cartoons on a network, but is stuck doing thankless jobs at a studio. The mask is discovered by his dog, Otis, and it finds its way onto Avery, who makes a free-wheelin' spectacle of himself at a company party, attracting the attention of his boss, played by Steven Wright. This allows him to start being able to make pitches.

The problem is, while wearing the mask, child-fearing Avery nails his wife Tonya (Traylor Howard), and she becomes pregnant, the result being now he's got a baby son--not so bad until he realizes his son can do wacky, otherworldly things, usually destructive and obnoxious. This leads to the important week where Avery gets a chance to pitch his ideas to a network, but Tonya has to go to New York for her job, and he has to spend a week alone with the little hellion. Meanwhile, the mask itself becomes a way for the dog to transform, feeling like he's being ignored with the new kid in the house, plotting to get rid of him.

The premise wouldn't be so bad if that's what they sort of focused on, which indeed, becomes the cartoon pitch Avery makes (dog and baby fight for attention). But instead, the movie is focused on being as annoying as possible--a story about a man who can't get work done because his son is a hellspawn, and I think even the most dedicated, caring mothers will want to strangle this baby when they see the things he does (especially with the accompanying little-bastard expressions). I think once you portray a baby knowing what it's doing, and does it maliciously, the "just-a-baby" excuse goes out the door. There's also a lame subplot where Loki (Alan Cumming, who's good in this thankless role), the father of the mask's creation and son of Odin (Bob Hoskins), tries to retrieve the mask that he has lost because Odin doesn't want humans being aware of or using the mystical article.

Son of the Mask owes everything to the old Warner Bros. cartoons (New Line is affiliated with Warner Bros. as an AOL/Time Warner company), and I lean on the side of theft rather than homage (there's a scene where the baby sees the WB frog in the classic cartoon--which I found myself laughing at more than this entire movie--and then emulating it, all the way down to not doing it when Avery wants to show someone). Also, it's got a Who Framed Roger Rabbit? feel, another movie that really did pay homage to the glory days of cartoons, and when you stick Bob Hoskins in the movie, the parallels become even more apparent. In that way, it becomes nearly criminal--taking an existing hit franchise for name recognition and then plundering the WB vault for ideas, then doing it poorly.