“Pain and Gain,” the new Michael Bay crime movie, has a few things going for it., First, there isn’t a robot in sight. Secondly, a great cast who bring serious star power and third, it doesn’t really feel like a Michael Bay film. And by that I mean there’s only one shot of the three leads walking away from a slow motion explosion.
Near the beginning a voiceover says, “Unfortunately, this is based on a true story.” It’s the real-life tale of three Miami-based body builders (Mark Wahlberg, Dwayne Johnson, and Anthony Mackie) chasing the American Dream. Pumped up and steroid crazy they abduct a prominent local businessman (Tony Shalhoub). They beat and torture the self-made millionaire until he signs over all his wealth—houses, cars, boats and money. The story eventually becomes so outlandish Bay flashes up a graphic in the last half hour reminding us that this is “still a true story.”
This is a seriously weird movie. It’s Bay working with a tiny—for him—budget of just $26 million. The guy has made commercials that cost more than that, but has delivered the darkest comedy—imagine if the Coen Brothers did gruesome slapstick—to come down the pike in a while.
Playing somewhere like an episode of “CSI: Miami” performed by the Three Stooges, the story of a trio of greedy dumb criminals—and they don’t get much stupider than this gang who couldn’t shoot straight—is violent, funny and unpredictable. The only thing you know for sure is nothing is going to go as planned.
It’s not understated, but then did you expect a movie directed by Bay and starring the world’s most famous wrestler to be subtle? Any idea of building a thematic treatise around the corrupting powers of he American Dream of wealth and power is thrown out the window early on in favor of Bay’s fixation with the absurd aspects of the story.
Instead it’s a wild ride that cruises along for over two hours—which is maybe twenty minutes too much—with the usual Bay touches—negligible roles for women and stylish photography that makes every shot look like it was ripped from a GQ layout—featuring likeable actors playing unlikable people.
It’s tough to make a funny movie about people who heartlessly kill innocent people. Bay cast well, finding actors who bring goodwill with them, and keep the audience on side even as the tone of the movie turns dark—or as dark as Bay can ever get with his stylish, glittering images.
As the ringleader of this funky bunch, Wahlberg plays a guy whose “heroes are all self-made: Rocky, Scarface and the guys from ‘The Godfather’.” He’s stupid, but doesn’t know it, and Mark shows how being a dim bulb with grandiose ideas can turn dangerous.
After a long series of unrewarding supporting roles Anthony Mackie gets a chance to shine and Shalhoub does impressive work, but the stand out is Johnson who finally has a role that marries his physicality to his impeccable comic timing.
“Pain and Gain” doesn’t scrimp on the violence and the nastiness of the story, but tempers it with some of the best gore gags this side of Tarantino. Case in point, Wahlberg ordering The Rock to “grill these fingerprints” off some decapitated hands. If you can stomach that, buy a ticket. If not, the next “Transformers” movie is set to be released next year.
“Snitch” boils down America’s War on Drugs™ to a family drama, focusing on one muscle-bound man’s determination to wrestle a deal from a hard-nosed US Attorney and free his son from jail.
The Rock… er… Dwayne Johnson is John Matthews, owner of a successful construction company and estranged father to Jason (Rafi Gavron). Jason falls into a Kafka-esque legal loophole when his drug-dealing best friend implicates him as a trafficker in return for a break on jail time. Under America’s strict War on Drugs™ laws Jason is facing a mandatory ten-year sentence unless he gives up the name of a co-conspirator but because he’s innocent he has no one to snitch on. Enter John who gets the action underway when he asks the US Attorney (Susan Sarandon), “What if I do it for him? What if I help you make arrests?” Cue the cage match between The Rock and assorted drug dealers (including “The Wire’s” Omar, Michael Kenneth Williams).
Snitch isn’t a bad movie, but it is a miscast one. As charismatic as Johnson is, his physicality gets in the way here. The character is a determined regular Joe; a father willing to go to any lengths to help his son, but how much more effective would this story have been if he didn’t resemble a cop who could crash the drug dealers he’s working with between his muscular thumb and forefinger?
Imagine the part played by an actor who doesn’t look like a superhero. As someone whose fatherly instincts kick in when his son is at risk and you’d have a believable core to the story. While John’s concern for his son seems genuine enough, with his shaved head, goatee and bulging muscles Johnson is a bit too much of a mountain of a man to pull off the meek act he tries with the drug dealers. Looking like The Rock works against him here.
“Snitch” is a hybrid of message film and thriller. The message is a bit muddled, but the idea seems to be that the War on Drugs™ needs to find a new plan of attack. Maybe if there’s a sequel Johnson could play a General in the War on Drugs™. Dress him up like a soldier and send him off to hunt down cartel kingpins. Now that’s a part I could see him playing.
The film career of Dwayne Johnson a.k.a. The Rock is a bit of a mystery. He is charismatic, well known, talented but what he isn’t is a movie star. From his humble beginnings as an action wannabe in “The Mummy Returns” and “The Rundown” to his stab at mainstream success in “Be Cool” and art house cred in “Southland Tales” to his most recent incarnation as a children’s entertainer he always seems to be on the cusp of a real, sustainable a-list movie career, but never seems to be able to get over the final fame hurdle. His movies haven’t been consistent quality wise or commercially—“Southland Tales” cost 17 million and only made 273K at the b.o.—and, I don’t think his latest, “Tooth Fairy”, is going to do much to improve that situation.
Johnson is Derek Thompson, a former big league hockey star now playing for the Lansing, Michigan Ice Wolves. He’s the team’s enforcer, a hip checking bad boy knick named The Tooth Fairy for his habit of leaving his opponents with a mouth full of bloody Chiclets. After telling his girlfriend’s daughter that the tooth fairy doesn’t really exist he receives a summons from the Department of Dissemination of Disbelief and is sentenced to two weeks as a real tooth fairy as punishment for crushing kid’s dreams. Adapting to the wings and newfound special powers he comes to realize the importance of dreams and aspirations.
Originally titled “Sweet Tooth,” the script for “Tooth Fairy” has been kicking around Hollywood since the early nineties and was long rumored to be a vehicle for Arnold Schwarzenegger. The premise was slightly different, but the jokes would have been about the same: squeeze a large man into a pink tutu and let the hilarity begin. Except that there isn’t much hilarity to be had.
Old pros Billy Crystal and Julie Andrews—who plays the Fairy Godmother as a cross between Mary Poppins and Judge Judy—work the material for all it is worth, but aside from the odd giggle and Fairy pun—Fairy Krishna’s anyone?—this is a one joke movie that gets most of its mileage out of the image of a tough guy wrestler wearing gossamer wings.
It is, in many respects a sillier version of Dwayne Johnson’s biggest hit, “The Game Plan,” a movie about a sports star who learns to access his softer side, but “Tooth Fairy” is too soft. Johnson has become too kid friendly. He’s now just a big teddy bear, with a range of expression that wouldn’t be out of place in an English pantomime. I know kids enjoy bigger than life characters like Johnson. He’s kind of a real life super hero, but I’m not sure the acting career he imagined for himself when he was working with directors like F. Gary Gray and Richard Kelly would involve prancing about in a pink tutu for the delight of small kids.
It’s a living, but it’s not am a-list career. Somebody has to learn how to harness Johnson’s natural charisma and talent and finally put him in a good movie!
