THE EMPIRE CLASSIC SCENE

ACE VENTURA: WHEN NATURE CALLS CHOSEN BY SIMON PEGG

Simon Pegg: “Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls is not the best film ever made, but it boasts a sequence so brilliant in execution, so artful in set up, it deserves recognition. I love the sheer industry involved in the set-up — a series of dummy gags used to carry exposition — all to facilitate a wildly ridiculous visual gag, executed with expertise by Jim Carrey.”

INT. fake RHINO — Day

Ace (Jim Carrey) has constructed a fake rhino from which to surveil Burton Quinn (Bob Gunton) as he has a clandestine rendezvous with a man.

ace: Meeting secretly with sinister types much? Ah, not too much. Ah, much too much!

Then the fan packs in. Ace taps it. It’s dead. He groans, and takes off his shirt.

ace: Kinda hot in these rhinos.

Time passes. The sun beats down. A now naked Ace peels off his underwear with a wet plop.

ace: WARM!

Sweat pours down his face. But then he sees Quinn hand the man an envelope.

ace: I had a dog, and his name was... BINGO!

Quinn and the man go their separate ways.

ace: Time to get some oxygen.

He turns the wheel to open the door, but nothing happens.

ace: No! Come on…

The wheel comes off in his hand. Panicking, Ace thrusts his shoulder against the exit to no avail.

ace: MAYDAY!

Now a cable breaks, covering him in fluid. Alarms begin to sound. Ace gasps for oxygen.

ace: Must… have… air!

Ace spies a shaft of sunlight behind him.

EXT. bush — Day

From outside the rhino, we see a finger poke out

from a hole in its rear end. Then Ace’s arm appears. A pair of safari vehicles pull up. A family — dad, mom, two kids — gets out of the first Jeep.

DAD: Come on, girls! Quiet quiet quiet quiet… look look look.

Now Ace’s head is pushing against the fabric of the rhino’s rectum. It looks like...

MOM: Oh look. The mother rhino is giving birth!

Ace’s face emerges, tongue-first. He’s making an inhuman squalling noise. The mother looks on and sighs, awestruck. Then, as two arms emerge from the rhino, she looks concerned. Next is Ace’s head, as he begins to chew his way out of the rhino.

LITTLE GIRL: Mommy!

Now Ace’s upper half slithers out. He roars like an angry walrus. The dad gags. Ace then slides out of the rhino and falls onto the ground in a foetal position. Completely naked.

LITTLE boy: Cool!

The boy’s parents don’t agree. They hustle their kids back into the Jeep.