Son Of The Mask Hollywood Movie
Jacqualine Henington
In Edge City, insecure bank teller Stanley Ipkiss is frequently ridiculed by everyone except for his co-worker and best friend, Charlie Schumaker. Meanwhile, gangster Dorian Tyrell, whose boss Niko owns the Coco Bongo nightclub, plots to overthrow Niko. One day, Tyrell sends his dazzling singer-girlfriend, Tina Carlyle, into the bank to record its layout for an upcoming robbery. Stanley is attracted to Tina and she seemingly reciprocates.
After being denied entrance to the Coco Bongo to watch Tina perform, Stanley's faulty loaner car breaks down during his drive home. While looking over the harbor bridge in despair, he tries rescuing a humanoid figure in the waters but finds it to be a pile of garbage concealing a wooden mask. Upon returning to his apartment and donning the mask, he is transformed into a green-faced and zoot-suited trickster, known as "The Mask", who can cartoonishly alter himself and his surroundings at will. With newfound confidence, Stanley indulges in a comical rampage through the city, humiliating several of his tormentors, including his temperamental landlady, Agnes Peenman, and the mechanics who gave him the faulty car.
The next morning, Stanley encounters detective Lieutenant Mitch Kellaway and newspaper reporter Peggy Brandt, who are investigating the Mask's activity. To obtain the funds necessary to attend Tina's performance, Stanley dons the mask and raids the bank, inadvertently foiling Tyrell's robbery. At the Coco Bongo, Stanley dances exuberantly with Tina, whom he ends up kissing. Shortly after, Tyrell confronts him for disrupting the robbery and Stanley flees, leaving behind a scrap of cloth from his suit, which reverts into a piece of his pajamas. After arresting Tyrell and his henchman, Kellaway finds the piece of cloth and suspects Stanley's involvement.
Later, Stanley consults psychiatrist Arthur Neuman, who has recently published a book on masks, and deduces that the mask may be a creation of Loki and its powers are only active at night. Though Neuman believes it is mythology, he concludes that the Mask's personality is based on Stanley's repressed desires. That night, Stanley meets Tina at a local park as the Mask, until they are interrupted by Kellaway, who attempts to capture him. Stanley flees with Peggy after he distracts the police with a mass performance of the titular song from Cuban Pete; she then reluctantly betrays him to Tyrell for a fifty thousand dollar bounty. After Tyrell becomes a bulky and malevolent being when he dons the mask, he has his henchmen force Stanley to reveal the location of the stolen money before turning him into the police along with a green rubber mask to implicate Stanley.
When Tina visits Stanley at the station, he urges her to leave the city, but not before she thanks Stanley for showing her kindness and telling him that the mask was unnecessary. She attempts to flee but is kidnapped by Tyrell, who prepares her for the charity ball at the Coco Bongo, hosted by Niko and attended by the city's elite, including the mayor. Upon arrival, the masked Tyrell murders Niko and prepares to destroy the club with a time bomb. Stanley's dog, Milo, helps his owner escape from the station by retrieving the keys from the guard. Stanley sets out to stop Tyrell, taking Kellaway hostage.
After locking Kellaway in his car, Stanley enters the club and enlists Charlie's help, but he is quickly discovered and captured. Tina tricks Tyrell into removing the mask, which is recovered and donned by Milo, who battles his way through Tyrell's henchmen as Stanley and Tyrell fight each other. Stanley retrieves the mask, uses its powers to dispose of the bomb seconds before it detonates and then sends Tyrell down the drain of the club's ornamental fountain; the police arrive and arrest Tyrell's henchmen. Kellaway tries arresting Stanley again, but the mayor intervenes, implicating Tyrell as the Mask and praising Stanley as a hero.
The following day, Stanley, now falsely exonerated and more secure, returns to the harbor bridge with Tina, Charlie and Milo. Discarding the mask, Tina and Stanley share a kiss, to the latter's delight. Charlie then tries to retrieve the mask for himself, only for Milo to swim away with it.
In 1989, Mike Richardson and Todd Moyer, respectively the founder and Executive Vice President of Dark Horse Comics, first approached New Line Cinema about adapting the former's comic book The Mask (and the subsequent series) into a "dark horror" film, after having seen other offers. The main character went through several transformations, and the project was stalled a couple of times.[7]
Initially intended to become a new horror franchise, New Line Cinema offered the job of directing the film to Chuck Russell.[9] Russell found the violence of the comic to be off-putting and wanted the film to be less grim and adult-oriented and more fun and family-friendly than the source material, redeveloping it as a comedy film.[10]
Mike Werb says Chuck Russell tapped him after reading his script for Curious George for Imagine. The two decided to turn The Mask into a wild romantic comedy.[11] Mike Werb wrote his first draft of The Mask in less than six weeks, and less than two months later, it was green-lit.[12]
According to Mark Verheiden, they had a first draft screenplay for a film version done back in 1990. Verheiden then wrote the second draft in early 1991, adding more humor, and that ended up being the only work he did on The Mask. Veriheiden's revised draft included more instances of fourth wall breaking like "cameos" by critics Siskel and Ebert, and dark content such as excessive bloodshed and sexual assault. The characters Stanley, Kellaway, and Doyle carried into the final film; Stanley's girlfriend Kathleen (inspired by Kathy from the comics) evolved into Tina Carlyle while Scully and Vitelli became Dorian Tyrell and Niko, respectively.[13] After that, the film entered development hell.[14]
In the early stages various actors were suggested as possibilities for the lead role, including Rick Moranis, Martin Short, and Robin Williams.[15]New Line executive Mike DeLuca sent a tape of Jim Carrey performing a sketch from the comedy show In Living Color to Richardson who was immediately impressed by the contortionist comedian.[15] Director Chuck Russell had seen Carrey perform live at The Comedy Store and followed him on In Living Color and was keen to cast him in the film. Carrey was top of his list and the script had been rewritten for him but Nicolas Cage and Matthew Broderick were also kept in consideration.[15] Producer Bob Engelman recalled Carrey had the flu during the filming:
Jim did things that, obviously when he became a superstar, he never would do. I remember one night when he was sick as a dog and he was throwing up and he said, "I can't do this." I said, "Look, Jim, they won't let us shut down. If we don't get this, we don't get this." We dragged him out of the trailer and he was a trooper and got it in there delivered and was fantastic. But those are the sort of things that would not have happened when Jim became the superstar that he became.[15]
Russell had wanted Anna Nicole Smith as Tina, but she had gone to do Naked Gun 33 1/3: The Final Insult instead. A costume director he had worked with had been recommending Cameron Diaz and they got her to audition for the part.[15] The character was originally written as a good girl who is actually bad but after Diaz was cast the part was rewritten to make her genuinely a good person.[15] Mike Richardson said to Forbes that Diaz was great on making the movie. "If you watch the film again, you'll notice scenes where Jim and Cameron are together. If you watch her face, oftentimes, Jim was doing something, and she would break out laughing the minute the scene ended".[15]
The Mask's visual effects were handled by Industrial Light & Magic (ILM) and Dream Quest Images. The sequences in the film which involved computer animation were supervised by ILM animation director Wes Takahashi.[16] Although many VFX scenes had to be cut for budget,[12] New Line invested more heavily on the special effects, as Jim Carrey was not yet an established star. Russell videotaped the rehearsals, then worked to design the effects out of Carrey's performance:
I insisted on working off Jim's face, on making the action organic to Jim's performance. No matter how good the effect is, if it's not coming out of character and story, it's not going to be effective ... The guys at ILM said they figured I saved about a million bucks once I got Jim, just on what he was able to do, versus what we intended to do originally.[17]
Make-up effects artist Greg Cannom wanted to bring out Carrey's exaggerated facial expressions through makeup.[18] Carrey's daily makeup sessions took four hours.[19] The costume included fake teeth meant to be used outside of dialogue scenes, but Carrey learned to wear them while talking to play the character more convincingly.[20]
The record labels TriStar Music and Epic Soundtrax released an orchestral score soundtrack to The Mask after the original soundtrack's release. The score was composed and conducted by Randy Edelman, performed by the Irish Film Orchestra, and recorded at Windmill Lane Studios Ireland.[23]
The film was a box-office success, grossing $119 million domestically and over $350 million worldwide,[3] becoming the second-highest grossing superhero movie at that time, behind Batman. In terms of global gross compared to budget, the film became the most profitable comic book movie of all time, and remained so until 2019, when Joker surpassed it.[24] The Mask is one of three films featuring Carrey (the others being Ace Ventura: Pet Detective and Dumb and Dumber) released in 1994 that helped launch the actor to superstardom; The Mask was the most successful of these three films both critically and commercially.
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