France's leading movie awards on Thursday gave Canadian-American actor Jim Carrey a special honour in recognition of his eclectic acting career, a tribute he accepted with a speech delivered in French.

"How was my French? Almost mediocre, right?" joked the 64-year-old Carrey as he accepted his Cesar d'honneur, recalling that he had a French relative dating back "around 300 years ago".

A standout figure of American cinema, who has been compared to comic luminaries such as Jerry Lewis, Carrey has stepped back from Hollywood in recent years.

The 51st Cesar Awards opened with a sketch celebrating Carrey by ceremony presenter Benjamin Lavernhe, who revisited one of Carrey's most legendary films, "The Mask".

His career began in stand-up comedy, before really taking off in the 1990s cult films like "Dumb and Dumber", "The Mask" and "Ace Ventura: Pet Detective".

Carrey turned toward more serious roles and won a Golden Globe for his performance in "The Truman Show" (1998), in which he played an ordinary man who realises his entire life has been orchestrated for television.

He also won acclaim for "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" (2004) about a lovelorn man who decides to have memories of his former girlfriend, played by Kate Winslet, erased from his mind.

Several international box-office hits including the "Sonic" franchise followed before he stepped back from the world of film in the early 2020s.

American veteran Richard Linklater won the best director award at the Cesars for his 2025 film Nouvelle Vague, a black and white work about the shooting of the Jean-Luc Goddard's French New Wave classic Breathless.