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| Courtesy of Paramount |
Michael
Bay has never been mistaken for an indie filmmaker, but Pain & Gain is probably
the closest he’s going to get. The fact-based crime story is modestly budgeted and
financed by a major studio, though it’s practically Clerks compared to the
rest of the director’s filmography. The twisted flick has been Bay’s dream
project for over a decade, and Paramount finally gave it the green light as a
thank you for the billions of dollars he made them with the Transformers
franchise.
Believe
it or not, Pain & Gain is actually pretty good despite its serious mean
streak (to see what I mean, read the specifics of the real-life case and then observe
which characters the movie’s asking you to root for). Granted, it’s a blatant Coen
brothers knockoff, but it’s nice to see Bay focus his admittedly dazzling eye on
something other than giant robots. Plus, he gets some genuinely great work out
of Mark Wahlberg, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, Anthony Mackie and a boatload of
terrific character actors.
Wahlberg
plays Daniel Lugo, a lunkhead ex-con stuck in a dead-end job at a Miami gym.
When he starts training a loathsome millionaire (Tony Shalhoub), Lugo decides to
realize his version of the American dream: stealing the guy’s money because he’s
ungrateful. After enlisting a couple of his muscle-bound buddies (Johnson and
Mackie) into the scheme, the trio descends into a world of torture, corruption,
accidental murder and gruesome cover-ups. When a shrewd private detective (Ed
Harris) catches wind of the plot, things begin to go south fast.
The
constant twists and turns of Christopher Markus’ and Stephen McFeely’s script plays
to Bay’s most well-known traits: his ADD and his weird love for morally-compromised
characters. Before the audience can spend too much time thinking about how disconcerting
it is to hope that Lugo and his crew get away with kidnapping, extortion,
murder, etc., Bay distracts them with another flashy car, a hot girl or an interesting
camera angle.
It
doesn’t hurt that the filmmaker casts incredibly charismatic actors to play his
criminals. Wahlberg doesn’t have a lot of range, but he’s fantastic whenever he
plays an idiot who believes he’s the smartest guy in the room. Mackie continues
his streak of underrated performances alongside more famous leading men; he’s
way overdue for a leading role in a mainstream movie.
And
there’s Johnson, who remains one of the most fascinating performers around. He’s
hilarious as a born-again cokehead who sees nothing contradictory about those
two characteristics, but he doesn’t make the guy into a cartoon. He comes
across as completely real, which is a difficult feat to pull off. It’s still
amazing to me that a guy with Johnson’s build is able to play such diverse
characters. Stallone and Schwarzenegger couldn’t pull it off, but the pro
wrestler does it effortlessly.
Not
everybody will enjoy Pain & Gain as much as I did, but those who like some
black comedy with their popcorn will find much to appreciate. It’s worth the
ticket price for Johnson’s performance alone. The guy’s entertaining as heck
even when he plays a psychopath.
Pain & Gain is rated
R for bloody violence, crude sexual content, nudity, language throughout and
drug use.
Grade:
B-
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