“The Running Man (2025)” - That’s THIS year!

The Running Man is one of the most appropriately timed movies I’ve ever seen. My son is currently studying dystopian novels in his language arts class, the film’s story is about a family that can barely afford food and can’t afford medicine for their sick child, and the main villain of the film is a greedy, fascist game show producer who runs the country through mass surveillance, propaganda, fear, and violence. And here’s the crazy (and terrifying) part - Stephen King wrote the original novel in 1982 and set the story in the year...2025.

Ben Richards (Glen Powell) badly needs money. He keeps getting fired from jobs over anger issues, his wife is working double shifts at some kind of dive, and his very young daughter has the flu and needs real medical attention. In desperation, Ben decides to audition to be on any of the sadistic game shows put on to distract people by feeding their bloodlust. After tryouts, he and two others are selected for the most lethal, but lucrative game - The Running Man. At first, he refuses to be on the game, but show producer Dan Killian (Josh Brolin) convinces him to do it.

The rules of the game are simple and are described to the audience very loudly and flamboyantly by show host Bobby T (Colman Domingo). The entire country is the game area. If Ben can avoid being killed for thirty days, he wins one billion dollars. For every day he survives, he wins money for his family. For every hunter or hunter’s minion he kills, he wins money for his family. To prove he’s still alive every day, he has to film himself for ten minutes and drop the tape in a drone mailbox. Trying to kill him are a team of hunters employed by the network, as well as literally every person in the country. Because, anyone can earn rewards for snitching on Ben’s whereabouts or outright murdering him. And just about everyone tries.

Like with The Long Walk, I’ve been waiting decades for an adaptation of The Running Man. And I mean a faithful adaptation. While the 1987 version featuring Arnold Schwarzanegger was fun (I watched dozens of times as a kid), it had almost nothing in common with the novel. Plus, it was definitely a B-movie movie that was very, very 1980s action and very, very Arnold.

It’s been about thirty years since I read The Running Man, so many of the details are fuzzy. But I remember the major points and they all seemed to be present in this new film. And I definitely remember the rules, which are identical. The rules are what made the novel so intriguing and I was ecstatic that the film kept them intact. The idea of having to survive for a month and not being able to trust anyone in the country is so much more interesting than Arnold being chased around an empty few blocks of game set by a couple of ridiculously dressed muscleheads. And the inclusion of the daily tapes is vital to the underlying social commentary regarding a fascist surveillance state controlling everyone.

Besides the plot being very well executed, the acting and action is really, really good. All of the supporting cast is great. There’s a great, early scene featuring William H. Macy barking at Powell’s Richards. There’s an excellent murder/fun house scene with Michael Cera having a ton of fun as a revolutionary. Lee Pace delivers an excellent head hunter who is both menacing and clearly reveling in the joys of murder as a game. And Colman Domingo hits the perfect amount of over-the-top every time the show cuts to him in the studio.

Then there are the two unequivocal stars of this film. Brolin’s Killian embodies everything we’ve come to hate in CEOs, corrupt politicians, and manipulative salesmen, complete with the fake smile and pretending that everything is on the level. Powell is even better as Richards. Not only does he have to convince us of Richard’s pure, unadulterated anger, but that he’s also a caring and compassionate human worth rooting for. And boy does he ever convince us. I know the Oscar awards typically overlook movies like this, but Powell’s performance is definitely deserving of that level of attention.

If none of that is of particular interest to you and all you care about is the action, this movie has you covered. There are car chases, explosions, booby traps, gun fire, helicopters, drones, and Powell doing some naked repelling off a rooftop. That’s right ladies and gentlemen - there’s beefcake to go with all the death and destruction. And it all looks great.

The only complaint I have is with the end of the climax. Compared to the book’s ending, the film pulls its punch a little bit. That’s not to say the end of the film is bad. In fact, it doesn’t stray all that much from the book’s finale. It just doesn’t have the impact that the book’s end does. But it doesn’t change how good the movie is as a whole. Not only did my son and I really enjoy it, but my son even started rattling off the dystopian elements in the film. Including the 2025 part.

Rating: Easily worth twice what you paid for it, even with our current inflation.

“Now You See Me: Now You Don’t” - Pick a card. No, not that card.

Prior to the screening of Now You See Me: Now You Don’t, we were treated to an in-person magic act in our theater. And by treated, I mean inflicted with. It was very, very not good. The act opened with a coin-flipping “trick” where we could clearly see the magician turning the coin in his hand post-flip to get the desired result. The act concluded with a cheap calculator trick that didn’t even have the decency to end with a punchline of ‘hello’ or ‘boobies.’ It was the kind of bad where the “highlight” was a kid yelling out six-seven-six-seven when asked for a four-digit number. It was the kind of bad that explains why this particular individual was opening for a free movie screening instead for something more prestigious, like a kid’s birthday party...or a prison event. It was the kind of bad that might trick the audience into thinking a bad movie is better than it really is. Now that I think about it, that would be a neat trick because Now You See Me: Now You Don’t is also very, very not good.

It’s been nearly a decade since 2016’s Now You See Me 2 and Now You Don’t acknowledges that span of time. The Four Horsemen have long since broken up as an illusionist group and appear to have also abandoned their membership in the secret vigilante magician society called The Eye. Filling the void left by the Horsemen is a trio of young copycats - Charlie (Justice Smith), June (Ariana Greenblatt) and Bosco (Dominic Sessa). After masquerading as the Four Horseman and robbing some crypto meme coin bros, actual Horseman Danny (Jesse Eisenberg) confronts them at their secret hideout, berates their clumsiness, then asks them to join him in a heist after revealing he received a tarot card message from The Eye.

The target of the heist is a gigantic diamond owned by Veronika Vanderberg (Rosamund Pike). Veronika is the head of a mining company that is also a front for an international crime syndicate. The plan is to steal the diamond so they can use it as collateral to take down the syndicate. But because this is a heist movie filled with witches and warlocks - and because we also saw the last two movies - we know there will be a twist where someone has a hidden agenda somehow linked to Veronika’s past.

During and after that initial diamond heist attempt, the rest of the Horsemen show up. And I do mean all of them. Merritt (Woody Harrelson), Jack (Dave Franco), Henley (Isla Fisher), and Lula (Lizzy Caplan) all return. Even Thaddeus (Morgan Freeman) returns, which made me remember how much I hated that Now You See Me 2 retconned Thaddeus to be a good guy.

This is where the movie basically turns to garbage. Don’t get me wrong, it’s still kind of entertaining in the same way that the Jurassic World movies are entertaining. It delivers the thing that is promised - more heist. And who doesn’t love a good heist? It also delivers a fairly fun action scene in a mansion that one part Winchester Mystery House and three parts state fair funhouse.

The problem is the magic element is all but gone from the heist. Even worse is that the Horsemen are practically useless because they barely use their skills for the entire film. There is almost no sleight of hand, no hypnotizing, no escape artistry, and only a few token card flings. Instead, they rely on dopey disguises, car theft, car chases, some very mediocre parkour, and another gag where they trick someone into thinking they’re somewhere they’re actually not. Oh, and lots and lots (and lots) of explaining things. At this point, they are far closer to being Ocean’s Seven than David Blaine.

What there was plenty of was actors mailing in their performances or exaggerating them to the point of maybe sabotaging the movie. Harrelson, Franco, and Fisher gave a minimum effort to their equally minimized characters (though, after watching Franco in Regretting You, he might have been giving his all). On the flipside, Pike’s performance was an over-the-top cringefest, complete with a South African accent so bad it’s best described as what if Foghorn Leghorn went apartheid.

The movie ends by very bluntly stating that there will be a fourth installment in the franchise, but it definitely doesn’t deserve one. All of the intrigue, charm, enjoyability, and yes, magic, of the initial movie was squandered in the sequel and stomped all over in this film. It’s the kind of movie that deserves to be opened by a magician struggling to reach the lofty title of dime-store magician.

Rating: Ask for all your money back and flip a coin to that magician.

“Predator: Badlands” - Kissyface.

There are a few words we would never associate with the Predator franchise. Buddy comedy. Heartfelt. Family-friendly. But that’s exactly what we get in the latest Predator movie - Predator: Badlands. Surprisingly, it’s not as bad as you think.

Like most of the franchise, Badlands is a standalone film featuring all new characters. But it also brings back plenty of elements from previous films to make sure fans are serviced. That includes more crossover with the Alien franchise, this time with a focus on the Weyland-Yutani corporation (and no xenomorphs). As usual, the corporation is trying to get its hands on a bioweapon, this time in the form of a very large, literally unkillable creature called a Kalisk. The Kalisk lives on a planet called Gemma that is filled with a myriad of other deadly creatures. And this time, the Weyland-Yutani crew is comprised entirely of synthetic beings, including their leader Tessa (Elle Fanning), so when they die horrible deaths, the movie gets to maintain its PG-13 rating.

Also hunting the Kalisk is a predator (Yuatja, as the species is called in this film) named Dek (Dimitrius Schuster-Koloamatangi). Yes, they have names now and it definitely makes them less scary. Dek arrived on Gemma after watching his father kill his brother Kwei (Mike Homik), because Kwei didn’t want his father to kill Dek, because Dek is kind of small for a Yautja. Dek wants to bag the Kalisk to prove to his father that he is strong, but Dek also wants to avenge Kwei’s death. If you didn’t follow that, good. It’s stupid.

Think about it for a moment. Why would a culture revolving around proving worthiness through hunting deem it necessary to kill undersized members of their society before giving them a chance to actually hunt something? And in a society with cloaking technology, faster-than-light travel, and energy weapons - why does dick size, I mean...physical size, matter? If all this sounds a little Klingon-y, wait until you see the Predators’ hair style and bat’leth-esque sword.

Once you’re done thinking about it, please enjoy the real reason for watching a Predator movie. Lots and lots of action. If this film got one thing right, it’s in the creation of formidable foes for the galaxy’s most feared hunter. Say goodbye to predators punching down to fight grizzly bears, evil doctors, 18th century Comanche, and Danny Glover. Say hello to Dek trying to survive fields of motion-sensing pods that explode out paralyzing thorns while dragons fling boulders into the fields. Watch as hordes of massive sentient vines steal Dek’s weapons and try to dismember him. Enjoy giant, tentacled monsters that live in the trees and try to eat Dek. And relish Dek befriending the torso of a synthetic being and an adorable, young, little Kalisk. Wait, what?

The predator has travelling companions?! Gross. Companion number one is the head and torso of the synthetic Thia (also Elle Fanning). And she is delightful. She smiles, she quips, she navigates, and she occasionally rips the heads off of dragons. In all seriousness, Thia absolutely steals this movie; Fanning understood her assignment.

Companion number two is dubbed Bud (by Thia). Despite knowing what a Kalisk looks like, Thia doesn’t recognize Bud as a Kalisk (remember, Thia is essentially a talking computer whose mission on the planet was to capture a Kalisk). And Bud is adorable. He’s got big puppy dog eyes, occasionally rips the tentacles off of tree monsters, and literally swaps spit with Dek. I’m not kidding - they spit on each other to mark the other as part of their clan. I promise you this is a Predator movie, not a Marvel movie (though, both are owned by Disney, so...).

If you think this movie has taken the franchise to a goofy level, it gets sillier; cartoonish elements abound. Thia’s detached legs are apparently sentient (they are pivotal in the climax). Dek uses an acid-spitting eel as his replacement shoulder blaster in the climax. Dek runs through a field of those exploding, poisoned-thorn plants, yet only gets hit by a single thorn. Bud exists at all. In one scene, Thia springs (still legless) from far offscreen to save Dek from being eaten by a dragon (and she kills the dragon) yet can barely drag herself across the ground for the rest of the film. And despite watching Tessa’s lightning-fast reflexes early in the film, she fights Dek in the climax using a slow-moving, Hulkbuster-sized cargo loader (a very unsubtle homage to Aliens).

Disappointingly, many of the things that make the predator cool are gone. Cloaking device? Gone. Bracer with retractable blades? Gone. Shoulder mounted blaster? Gone. The cool mask that lets predators see multiple spectrums of light? Gone. But now he has a big glowy sword, so it’s all good. I promise you this is a Predator movie, not a Star Wars movie (though, both are owned by Disney, so...).

The best way to describe this movie is what my friend said, “it didn’t feel like a Predator movie.” Exactly. As much as I appreciate the action, creature effects, and Fanning owning this film, being asked to accept the predator as a kind-hearted, family-oriented softie just felt wrong. Though it does explain why a tiny Comanche girl with a rope and a hatchet, not to mention Danny Glover, were able to defeat their predators.

Rating: Ask for at least half of your money back, depending on how you feel about a mostly neutered predator.

“Regretting You” - Took the words right out of my mouth.

Regretting You is now the second Colleen Hoover novel adaptation I’ve seen, after last year’s It Ends With Us. I hope there isn’t a third adaptation because neither of these movies were what one might describe as “good” or “entertaining” or “worth it.” And like with It Ends With Us, I did not take anyone with me to Regretting You because it’s far funnier to be one of four men in a theater packed with women, watching a movie best described as what if the Lifetime Channel got drunk and fell down the stairs?

By the way, I knew what I was getting into when I RSVP’d for the screening of Regretting You. Not the story itself - I don’t hate myself enough to read a Hoover novel on purpose. But I read the synopsis blurb and saw the movie poster and figured I apparently do hate myself enough to spend two hours in a theater watching another Hoover adaptation.

Hey, all you Hoover fans - are all of her books as depressing as It Ends With Us and Regretting You? Do all of her books include a lost teenage romance, domestic abuse, infidelity, melodramatic happy endings that are only possible after worst-case scenarios, or all of the above? Is this why you drink so much wine in your book clubs?

If it sounds like my cynicism meter is in the red, you are correct. It’s been in the red since roughly five minutes into watching Regretting You. The film starts with high-school aged Morgan (Allison Williams), Jonah (Dave Franco), Chris (Scott Eastwood), and Jenny (Willa Fitzgerald) at a party. Morgan and Chris are a couple, Jonah and Jenny are a couple, Morgan and Jenny are sisters, and all of them are friends. This party scene only lasts a couple of minutes, but it’s painfully obvious that Morgan and Jonah love each other (but do nothing about it) and Chris and Jenny are definitely cheating on Morgan and Jonah with each other. And the scene ends with Morgan telling Jonah she’s pregnant.

Seventeen years later, Morgan and Chris are married with their now seventeen-year-old daughter Clara (Mckenna Grace). Jonah and Jenny have recently reunited and have a new baby themselves. While celebrating Morgan’s birthday, Morgan casually remarks how the baby looks exactly like Clara when Clara was a baby. Got it...the baby is the result of Chris still cheating on Morgan with Jenny (Jonah and Morgan don’t figure this out until much later in the film). That sound you hear is the Lifetime Channel doing a keg stand.

The next day, Morgan and Jonah are independently summoned to the hospital, surprised to find each other there, then told that Chris and Jenny were killed in a car accident. Jonah quickly realizes Chris and Jenny were having an affair and Morgan demands Jonah keep it a secret from Clara. To add to the drama, Clara blames herself for the accident because she thinks Jenny was texting and driving while texting with Clara. Oh, and their conversation revolved around Clara liking a boy named Miller (Mason Thames) and Jenny warning Clara not to be the other woman. That sound you hear is the Lifetime Channel hitting the banister at the bottom of the stairs.

Now that Jenny and Chris are out of the picture, it’s only a matter of time before Morgan and Jonah confess their lost love for each other. And it’s only a matter of time before Clara finds out about Chris and Jenny’s affair. And it’s only a matter of time before Clara and Miller bone because they’re seventeen. Nothing in this movie is the least bit surprising and now the Lifetime Channel is now lying unconscious in a pool of its own vomit.

The story isn’t the only thing that made this movie a terrible watch. The acting ranges from a solid Grace, to a very uneven and uncommitted Williams, to mostly literal jaw-clenching from Thames, to a wildly miscast deer-in-headlights Franco. And shoutouts to Eastwood, Fitzgerald, the criminally underutilized Clancy Brown (as Miller’s grandpa), and the criminally overused Sam Morelos (as Clara’s friend) for collecting a paycheck by appearing in this dreck.

On top of that, the tone of the film is all over the place. There’s practically zero consideration of the affair beyond it being a convenient excuse for Morgan and Jenny to barely care that their significant others are dead. Just kick a car a few times, throw a few eggs at an ugly painting, abandon a baby for a couple days, and kick a hole in an annoying door and everything will be right as rain. Even Clara barely grieves for her dead relatives before moving on to a bunch of AMC branded movie dates with Miller. It’s like the movie knows emotions are a thing that exists but has never actually felt any of them.

The moral of the story - mine, not the movie’s - is don’t take a date to see this movie. Or any Hoover film adaptation. And probably don’t read another Hoover book. But do please help the Lifetime Channel get home. They don’t look good.

Rating: Ask for all of your money back and another glass of wine.

“Good Fortune” - How do angels get their wings?

Good Fortune, a movie featuring Aziz Ansari and Seth Rogen - and Keanu Reeves as an inept angel - seemed like exactly the kind of movie I was craving. Something light-hearted and goofy because I just wanted to laugh for a couple hours. To forget about real life for a while. Definitely not to be depressed and pissed off at society at the conclusion of the film. You had ONE job, funny guys.

Arj (Ansari) is a gig worker living in his car. His gigs include being paid to stand in line for hours to buy a bagel, sorting crap in someone’s garage, and doing somebody’s laundry. This isn’t some new career invented in the last decade, by the way. People like Arj used to be referred to as assistants, maids, servants, or butlers. The difference is those people were typically employed full-time by whomever they were serving, sometimes being housed by those same employers. Think Downton Abbey or The Help or The Devil Wears Prada, but way, way more depressing.

After completing a gig for rich, tech-bro, venture capitalist Jeff (Rogen), Arj convinces Jeff to hire him as a full-time assistant. Everything starts to look up for Arj and by up I mean barely making enough money to live in a disgusting motel instead of his car. Unfortunately, Arj gets fired for using Jeff’s corporate credit card to pay for a dinner date one night, despite promising Jeff he would pay back the money. Arj soon finds there’s an even deeper rock bottom when his car/house gets towed. Hilarious, right?

Observing all this is an angel named Gabriel (Reeves). Not to be confused with the archangel from the Bible who serves as God’s messenger, Reeves’ Gabriel is entrusted with the responsibility of subtly alerting texting-while-driving humans into avoiding imminent accidents. Gabriel took an interest in Arj when he noticed Arj texting about having nothing to live for and believes Arj is a lost soul that needs to be saved. Despite Gabriel’s boss Martha (Sandra Oh) telling Gabriel not to stray from his assigned duties, Gabriel decides to Trading Places (or Freaky Friday for the gig generation) Jeff and Arj.

Gabriel thinks that if Arj spends a few days in the shoes of a rich person, Arj will realize his old, destitute life was worth living. Clearly, Gabriel is woefully naive, if not a complete moron. As Arj puts it a few days later “being rich solved all my problems.” Yeah, of course it did. That’s why rich people never give away all their money. The problem Gabriel now has is that he can’t restore Jeff and Arj to their former lives until Arj wants to go back. And, of course Arj doesn’t want to go back. And Jeff definitely wants his life back after trying and failing to live in Arj’s shoes for a few days.

Instead of using all of this setup to steer us to ha-ha land, writer/producer/director Ansari decided steer us in the opposite direction by focusing film on a bunch of social issues. Which for the record, is very admirable; our society is pretty messed up and getting worse much faster since the 2024 election. On top of the overt commentary regarding the plight of gig workers and the gig economy in general (including the desperation for good ratings in the apps used to hire gig workers), Ansari dives into unionization efforts, privileges certain people are born into, people working three jobs just to survive (living wages), and the callousness and ignorance of people who say idiotic things like “they can just get better jobs if they don’t like it.”

The messages do get across, but they are softened, if not altogether blunted, by the inclusion of the clueless Gabriel. After Gabriel’s colossal screw up, Martha fires him and makes him human (though says she will reconsider if Arj chooses to go back to his former life). Many of the messages Ansari wants to get across come via Gabriel, which makes the poor versions of Jeff and Arj redundant. And Gabriel steals the show every time he reacts in surprise to a first human experience. Eating a hamburger, sweating, or expressing disappointment when he sees how much of his first paycheck isn’t going into his pocket are all given the same weight in the screenplay. It’s funny unless it’s tragic.

Good Fortune isn’t a bad movie, but it is very confused about what it’s supposed to be. The entire cast, including Keke Palmer as Arj’s love interest Elena, do what they can to lift the film, but the screenplay can’t get of its or their way. There are occasional moments of comedy, but they are dwarfed by the serious issues in the film. And all muddled by the inclusion of angels doing menial tasks. Which might be an even sadder existence than the life of a gig worker.

Rating: Ask for twelve dollars back and remember to give me a good review.

“Tron: Ares” - We used smaller words this time.

It's been fifteen years since Tron: Legacy came out and about a hundred years since the original Tron released, based on how much Jeff Bridges appears to have aged. So, if you forgot everything about both Tron movies like I did, that’s ok. I watched Legacy again prior to screening Tron: Ares and you definitely don’t need to. Not only is Ares a completely different story, but Ares even takes a moment to explain what you’re seeing using words with fewer than four syllables.

Raise your hand if you know what an isomorphic algorithm is or means. One of you, maybe? Unless you have a degree in computer science or memorized a dictionary, Tron: Legacy was very confusing. How about this - when you watched Tron or Tron: Legacy, did you understand that everyone and everything you saw in the grid (the computer world) was anthropomorphized computer software and hardware? You’re lost again, aren’t you? Well, I’ve got good news for you. Tron: Ares still features software depicted as humans and machines and stuff, but now you don’t need a background in programming to understand it.

Ares (Jared Leto) is a security program designed by Julian Dillinger (Evan Peters), CEO of Dillinger Systems. Julian’s company has figured out how to bring anything from the grid into the real world using lasers. Tanks, airplanes, guns, Ares...anything. Think 3-D printing, but way cooler. Dillinger is hoping to convince the military to give his company contracts to create an infinite supply of weapons and soldiers. The catch is that those same weapons and soldiers disintegrate after twenty-nine minutes. To resolve this problem, Julian needs the permanence code. Yes, that code does exactly what you think it does.

Also searching for the permanence code is Eve Kim (Greta Lee), CEO of ENCON International. Eve’s company has also figured out to bring anything from the grid into the real world using lasers. Eve is trying to find the code in order finish her sister’s work (her sister died from cancer), which was to use the code to cure cancer and solve world hunger (also using that laser technology). In case you’re not sure who the good guys are, the bad guys are the ones wearing red.

Well, except Ares. He starts out as a bad guy, but it’s pretty obvious early in the film that Ares will become a good guy. You see, this movie is mainly about artificial intelligence because all the Tron movies are about artificial intelligence. And in movies, artificial intelligence always evolves beyond its original programming. In this case, Ares evolves to understand empathy by observing Eve and Dillinger. Eve shows empathy and Dillinger shows a lack of it. Ares agrees to help Eve in exchange for Eve adding the permanence code to Ares so he can escape from Dillinger’s grid forever.

Got all that? It might sound a bit complicated, but it boils down to a race for a MacGuffin to turn Pinocchio into a real boy, cure cancer, and feed the hungry or...make lots of money by promoting war. And it’s a really fun race because Tron movies are quite entertaining when you get past all of the philosophical mumbo jumbo.

Like Legacy, Ares features great special effects, great action sequences, and a killer soundtrack (this time from Nine Inch Nails). Visually, the coolest thing Ares does is mix some of the digital world stuff into the real world. Picture one of those flying, blocky arch things crashing through real-world buildings. Or a lightcycle battle through the streets of a real-world city. Don’t worry - there are also some fantastic action scenes inside the grid. And for you weirdos that loved the look of the first Tron, Ares even includes a sequence of scenes that take place in creator Kevin Flynn’s (Jeff Bridges) original grid, 1982 special effects and all.

Even better is the music. I enjoyed Daft Punk’s music in Legacy, but Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross of Nine Inch Nails created something really special for Ares. Every bit of music seemed to perfectly fit each scene and hearing and feeling it in IMAX was exquisite. It’s the kind of thing that makes you want to tell your parents “I told you so” (if, like me, you grew up when Nine Inch Nails peaked in popularity).

Given how long it’s been since Legacy, it was a bit of surprise to find out a new Tron movie was even coming out. I wasn’t sure what to expect, but I’d be lying if I said my expectations weren’t very guarded. I’d also be lying if I told you I didn’t notice a couple of flaws. Even in this much more streamlined and simplified story, there are a couple of plot holes that are worth an eyebrow raise. And Gillian Anderson (playing Dillinger’s mother) choosing to affect a thick English accent despite nobody else joining her was worth raising both eyebrows. Not that I blame her - her role is almost comically thankless.

But the film as a whole more than made up for those things, including supporting performances from Jodie Turner-Smith as Ares’ subordinate Athena and Arturo Castro as Eve’s fellow programmer (comedic relief). By focusing and improving on the things people really liked in previous films and dispensing with nearly all of the computer jargon, Ares is a neurologically pleasing technical and aesthetic achievement. Or to put it in words you (and Kevin Flynn) would understand, the film is rad, man.

Rating: Don’t ask for any money back, digital or analog.

"The Smashing Machine" - Who dis?

I noted in my review of One Battle After Another that I had seen exactly none of director Paul Thomas Anderson's previous films. That is nearly the case with The Smashing Machine's director, Benny Safdie. I’ve seen exactly one of Safdie’s films - Uncut Gems. And I hated Uncut Gems. A lot. Apparently, I hated it so much that I my subconscious made me forget to include it in my 2019 Year in Review.

I didn’t know Safdie was the director of The Smashing Machine until after I watched the movie, so I wasn’t biased going into it. In retrospect, it makes total sense that it was directed by Safdie (this time directing solo). Uncut Gems came off like a naked attempt to see if Safdie (and his brother and co-director Josh) could yank an Oscar-worthy performance out of Adam Sandler. Many people thought they had, but I found the performance insufferable because I don’t enjoy watching someone scream-act their way through a film. The Smashing Machine also comes off like a naked attempt to see if Safdie can extract an Oscar-worthy performance, this time from Dwayne Johnson. Yes, that Dwayne Johnson.

I’m not alone in wondering why The Smashing Machine is a feature length film. I’m not even alone in wondering why it’s a film at all. It’s a biopic of a mixed martial arts (MMA) fighter named Mark Kerr. Wait, who? Mark...something, who might be the most who? of MMA fighters ever. Everyone exiting the theater had the same question - why Mark Kerr? Wait, who? Something...Kerr? Exactly. Imagine someone making a movie about second baseman Marty Barrett of the 1986 Red Sox. Who indeed.

Kerr (Johnson) was an MMA fighter in the earlier days of MMA and the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC). And by earlier, I mean 1997-2009. The film focuses on the middle part of his career from 1999 to 2000, specifically two tournaments in Japan, as well as his personal life. It’s the point in his career where he was at his peak, then saw his career begin an unremarkable downward journey experienced by a million athletes before him.

The title implies that we’re going to get to see some of Kerr’s fights where he demolishes other human beings. And at first, we do. Briefly. In a shaky-cam, outside-the-ropes montage of Kerr fighting his way to an 11-0 record. Complete with commentary telling us how devastating he is because the footage showing it to us is hardly convincing. I expected to see Kerr standing over the bloody pulps of his vanquished foes, but instead we saw the same sweaty, mildly bloodied fight endings of most modern MMA/UFC fights. What we could see through the ropes, that is.

I thought maybe Safdie chose Kerr because Kerr was instrumental in the UFC gaining popularity, especially since this was during the time Congress and most states were trying to ban UFC and MMA fights altogether. But nope. The film makes a point of showing Kerr actively reject fighting in the UFC because Pride offered more money. Inspiring, no?

Maybe it was Kerr’s personal life that made him an intriguing sports subject? Again, not even close. As Tom Hanks’ character laments in That Thing You Do! - “it’s a very common tale.” Kerr is in a rocky relationship with his girlfriend Dawn (Emily Blunt). Dawn seems bipolar, her emotions swinging wildly from doting and caring to gold-digger to instigator to suicidal. Mark seems like a gentle giant, saving his anger for the ring and straining not to punch Dawn into another timeline every time she picks a fight with him. And they fight. A lot.

Mark is also addicted to painkillers. Big surprise, right? We don’t know for how long he’s been addicted, but it’s definitely months, if not years, prior to his first failure in the ring in the first of the Japan tournaments we see. After that fight, his addiction spirals so much that he ends up in the hospital after an overdose. After recovering, he goes to rehab, gets better, and it’s back to fighting. That’s it. No real drama, no suspensions or sanctions from fighting, no match where he starts spasming and collapses into a pool of his own vomit while forty million people watch on Pay-Per-View. Just your typical, run-of-the-mill drug addiction quietly conquered by your typical, run-of-the-mill rehab. Like a million people before him.

So, seriously, why Mark Kerr? Best I can come up with is Kerr is such an aggressively average and uncomplicated human that Safdie was confident Johnson could definitely handle the range required to portray Kerr. Doesn’t hurt that 1999 Kerr and Johnson share the same body physique, though the prosthetics and makeup applied to Johnson’s head and face to make him look more like Kerr (and less like Johnson) was far more of a distraction than anything it might have added to the realism. It also didn’t help Johnson that Emily Blunt was brilliant, overshadowing Johnson in every scene, and made Dawn a more intriguing character than Kerr. Even the character of Mark Coleman (Ryan Bader), Kerr’s longtime friend and fellow fighter, was more interesting than Kerr. Coleman’s story follows the standard sports movie formula. He’s the grizzled, older underdog making a comeback – and unlike Kerr, Coleman wins.

As it turns out, this isn’t even the first film made about Kerr. This film appears to be a remake of a 2002 HBO documentary also titled The Smashing Machine. That documentary also focuses on the same time period (1997-2000) and hits the same beats, including Dawn and painkillers. However, the documentary was just 78 minutes long, whereas the new film is 123 long minutes. Even 78 minutes feels too long. This story is barely enough to fill an ESPN 30-for-30 episode (60 minutes) and it would be a very run-of-the-mill 60 minutes.

Rating: Ask for half of your money back, just like a million other people before you.