While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

Just intense enough to provide a much-needed diversion, just lightweight enough to make you forget about it soon after it’s over. It’s not exactly “good,” per se, but it does what it sets out to do in terms of putting us on edge, which makes it … successful?

It is interesting even when nothing much happens, which is for most of its 3-hour running time. Read full review

MaskIf inner beauty were important Miss America would have a colonoscopy portion of the show.That is why the deformed student in this drama is having a hard time fitting in.Born with cranial disfigurement Rocky Dennis (Eric Stoltz) wasn't expected to survive. But with the love of his mother (Cher) and her biker gang, Rocky proved medical science wrong. And he'll do it again as his enter junior high.While students initially react poorly to his appearance, Rocky wins them and his teachers over with his humour and intellect. However, his health and his mom's addictions undermine his scholastic achievements. With believable performances, a touching script and remarkable make-up, this true story doesn't pander to the public to get its point of accepting others across. Hopeful, without being pretentious or exploitative, Mask is a bonafide tearjerker.Incidentally, facial disfigurement and scientific brilliance are the leading cause of super-villainy among teenagers. Green Lightvidiotreviews.blogspot.ca

If you want to talk about natural performances, no one could claim to have done better work in nineteen-eighty five than Eric Stoltz, who gave a brilliant performance through heavy make-up in Peter Bogdanovich's Mask. Based on a true story, he plays Rocky Dennis, a teenager who was born with craniodiaphyseal dysplasia, or "lionitis", a rare sclerotic bone disorder that caused disfigurement in his face. But the movie isn't about clinical details, there are no overriding strides to make him "normal". This is simply the story of a young teenager and his often frustrating world.When we meet him, the movie doesn't point to his ailment. Our initial reaction is only natural but once we get comfortable with his personality, we hardly seem to notice. He is an average kid who lives with his mother Rusty (Cher) who travels in a circle of biker friends, takes drugs and has a never-ending series of rotating boyfriends. She is irresponsible, but a good mother who loves her son and we get a sense of routine when she tries to enroll him in school and the principal (visibly shocked) suggests that he might be better off in a school that would "be better suited to his needs". "Do you have algebra?", she asks. "Yes", the man says. "Those are his needs." she tells him. There is a tone to her voice and an urgency that suggests that she has had this conversation over and over and over. What makes the moment special is what Rocky says next, smiling at the principal he tells him "Don't worry, Mr. Simms. I look weird, but otherwise I'm real normal. Everything'll be cool." Rocky has a specific personality, he has a way of disarming the initial shock of his looks the moment he begins to speak. He's smart, he's sensitive, he is growing aware of the world outside, of motorcycles and of girls. He writes poems about the things that he likes and has a dream of someday riding motorcycles across Europe with his best buddy.His mother has always instilled in her son the constant reminder that he is completely normal, "You're more beautiful on the inside than most people", she tells him. He has a way of disarming people's reaction like a scene at his locker at school when he notices a group of kids staring at at him. "What's the matter? Haven't you ever seen anyone from the planet Vulcan before?" Later, on his first day at summer camp, the counselor instructs him to take off his mask and Rocky, in good spirits, responds "I could try but I don't think it'll come off". I love the way we see the principal's initial reaction and then later we see the same man approach him as if he were an old friend.The movie rarely points to Rocky's looks, it only comes into the story sideways and only at specific moments. There is a moment at a carnival when he and his friends are looking in a funhouse mirror when he sees himself, he sees what he might look like with a normal face. The only time it ever becomes a hindrance is when he gets a girlfriend for the first time. Rocky becomes a counselor at a summer camp for the blind, where he meets Diana Adams (Laura Dern) a blind fellow counselor and the two falls in love in one of the most beautiful teen romances that I can remember. They share the kinds of wonderful moments that teenagers share, when love means having time together, not with sex, but just together doing the same things. The stumbling block happens when he meets her parents who are shocked by Rocky's looks and don't want their daughter involved with him. Returning home, he tries time and again to call but is told that she can't come to the phone.Most of this comes from Stoltz who plays this role outside the make-up, as if he's playing a character without a disability. He creates a specific character that we care about from the moment that we hear him speak. I have a litmus test for a movie like this: Would the character be as interesting if he didn't have this disorder? My problem with The Elephant Man is that if you looked under John Merrick's physical deformity, there isn't much of a character to care about. In the case of Rocky Dennis, he could have been portrayed as a teenager without a disfigurement and he would have been just as interesting.

Right up front: I had to give the ending away, okay.Some roles are born for actors. The role of Rocky Dennis was most certainly "born" for Eric Stoltz.I once read that actor Eric Stoltz had been cast to play the role of Marty McFly in (yeah, you guessed it) "Back to the Future." But, for whatever reason, Michael J Fox was given the honor instead. Fortunately, all of us now have the honor of seeing Stoltz in this film, which was released the same year. MASK is based on the true story of a young man with a rare facial deformity in which calcium deposits formed on his skull and grew, causing his scalp and face to stretch and become elongated, while putting pressure on his spinal chord, and giving him massive headaches. It's the story of Rocky's struggle to be "normal" and fit in... when he was born to stand out.This is a movie that I will always watch again and again...strictly because of the incredible, endearing performances by Stoltz, as well as Cher,Sam Elliot, and a young Laura Dern.While Rocky is trying to find out who he is, he actually has a bigger problem: his mother. As his school principal points out: (Rocky's mom) "never gives the impression that she cant take care of herself." But it's only an impression. One scene in the film depicts an argument between mother and son. Dishes are shattered and Rocky tells his mother that he hates her going out all the time and coming home wasted. His mother fires back, saying that her son tries too hard to control her life, by strategically placing pamphlets about a "chemical dependency" center around the house. The two go from explosive arguing, to his mother stroking his hair the next morning and telling him to "pick something." Rusty comes home in the wee hours, this time to discover that her son has one of his headaches. No medication is used to help them go away...it's more like visualization. Rocky "picks out" something peaceful and calming in his mind. He describes to his mother what he's seeing (he and his best friend on a boat).The next morning, Rusty makes a promise to her son that she will "cut it down;" a promise that is soon broken when Rocky's grandparents come to visit. The three return from a Dodgers game to find her so wasted that her parents have no choice but to drive back home, leaving Rocky to once again take care of his mother. Rocky decides he needs a break, and takes his school principal up on an offer to go to a summer camp for the blind. This will be a much needed break.This movie's about bikers: their vests, their jackets, their protective loyalty, their fights, their drugs, their motorcycles. The film also depicts a rider being buried with his Harley. The soundtrack brings this to light perfectly, with artists like Steely Dan and Little Richard.Now, this movie also has some alarming inconsistencies... and I am unable to point them out without giving away the film's ending. In fact, I'll start there. Young Rocky succumbs to his illness one night in his sleep, and at the very end, his mother and her now love interest Gar (Sam Elliot) go out to the cemetery to place flowers (and a few cherished baseball cards) at Rocky's grave. On the gravestone, the year of death reads 1980. However, a record of Rocky's death I discovered over the internet had the year of his death listed as 1978, and there was no location of a graveside listed (findagrave.com). Instead, the record reads that Rocky's body was donated to UCLA medical research. Is there a grave somewhere that reads "1980"? I don't know; but the impression given is that we are looking at Rocky's real graveside, which (in the film) reads "Roy L. Dennis". The film also depicts Rocky as being an only a child, but biographies of the famous teenager do reveal that he had a brother. This is mentioned nowhere in the movie. Understandable, since Rocky himself is the main focus, but as to it's biographical accuracy (??)There are also two different versions of this film. One of them depicts the death of one of the characters, Red, (Harry Carey) while the other...does not show us that he died. The original 1985 release lets Red live through the whole story, and there is no burial of the bike with the biker.Then there's the odd issue of different soundtracks (??). The original release, has a rockin' Bob seiger soundtrack (which I personally prefer). The DVD release of the movie (somewhere around 2004) has a Bruce Springsteen Soundtrack instead. The extra's on the DVD reveal that director Peter Bogdanovich had originally wanted a Springsteen soundtrack, and permission had come from Springsteen himself to use his music in the movie. But others who worked on the film decided that Sieger was more appropriate for the story (apparently), and the film was released with a Bob Sieger soundtrack(without Bogdanovich's knowledge).DVD extras also reveal that Bogdanovich and Cher got into continual disputes during filming as to the character of Rusty Dennis. Bogdanovich was said to have not been thrilled with such an edgy, mouthy, portrayal of the boy's mother. But Cher said that having met the real Rusty Dennis, she knew that her portrayal of the character was accurate

Some articles or short biographies about Peter Bogdanovich that I've read assert that his career has not amounted to as much as it could have. His 1985 masterpiece "Mask" should disprove that. It tells the story of teenager Roy L. "Rocky" Dennis (Eric Stoltz), who suffered from craniodiaphyseal dysplasia that left him with an enlarged face. He and his biker mother Rusty (Cher) do what they can to live their lives normally, understanding that it will be an uphill climb.One of the impressive parallels is the relationships that they develop. Rusty is involved in a relationship with fellow biker Gar (Sam Elliott), and they're pretty much the same kind of person. Rocky attends the camp for the blind where he befriends Diana (Laura Dern); she can't see what he looks like, but she accepts him for being a nice person.So this is definitely one that I recommend. It not only shows the triumph of the human spirit confronting adversity, but affirms the talent of all parties involved. Really good.Also starring Estelle Getty, Richard Dysart and Harry Carey, Jr.