San Andreas

The action stars of this movie are the earthquakes and the tsunami, the Rock is just some guy flying a helicopter. This is the most un-Rock movie I have seen to date. He doesn’t kill anyone, shot anyone, break any one’s back or even takeoff his shirt. No pectoral dancing here ladies. Oh a correction, he does punch out one obnoxious looter.

The Rock and his estranged wife are looking for their daughter amidst the devastation of the San Francisco earthquake. I am not dissing this noble cause, but this is not Rockish. You would expect him to be knee deep in rubble saving babies and lifting trucks of the legs of some priest. Just rushing around looking for his daughter is boring. It is more boring when his daughter is a very smart and capable young woman able to take care of herself. She handles distress well. Anyone want to guess the ending?

There were actually flashes of acting on the Rock’s part. Getting all pissy about signing divorce papers and giving the new boyfriend the stinky eye. There was even a passionate kiss with his wife lasting a bit too long (closed mouth).

The earthquakes were biblical. Buildings fell like Jenga blocks with total disregard to building codes. Modern buildings in seismic areas are required to have life saving features. Then there is the claim of predicting earthquakes made by the head of Cal Tech’s seismic department played by Paul Giamatti. When they predicted an earthquake it was already occurring. That is not what predicting means. A prediction is something before it happens not when. Surprisingly Giamatti’s character does not know how probability works. A poor actuary sitting next to me groaned. 

This movie harkens back to the disaster films of the 1970’s: Airplane, Towering Inferno and Earthquake. Aside for innovations in computer graphics this film has the same chunkiness of its predecessors. The spectacle  overwhelms the story.

I hope this is not a trend for the Rock.  Please stick to mayhem, fast cars, guns and women of questionable morals. Anyone can save a lady in distress, but can they make their pecks dance?

Pain and Gain - I Hope I Forget Rebel Wilson's Sex Scene

Pain & Gain

This was not a funny movie; deceptive advertising at work again. There were a few funny bits mostly delivered by Rebel Wilson. This is a true story about three body builders who commit some heinous crimes. These numb nuts are dumber than dirty. Mark Walberg, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson and Antony Mackie are the body builders. These guys were seriously jacked. The Rock was so huge his tattoos almost faded away. Walberg looked like he was made out of rolls of baloney and could not put his arms down by his sides.

Walberg is the leader of this band of fools. He is the “Doer” as opposed to the “DoNotDoer”. Walberg picks up this mantra from Ken Jeong (the nasty Asian guy in the Hangover movies) who plays a dubious motivational speaker. So in his peanut brain Walberg plots a money making scheme that of course goes horribly wrong. The movie is series of missteps that somehow these idiots manage temporally work out but invariably fall apart.

The Rock is a recently released Jesus loving convict. His contribution to the gang was not only his muscles but his willingness to do dumb violent things.  The Rock gives a very good performance. In the course of the movie he transforms from a God fearing gentle ex-con to a paranoid coke addict.  It took some acting skill to do this. The whole cast did a great job. Walberg channeled his Markie Mark persona. Tony Schalhoub played the Colombian Jew role spewing rudeness and nastiness (anti Monk). Antony Mackie played a good third wheel and his contribution to violence was well received. Ed Harris had a small but important as the PI. He wore his usual cool confident facade on his thin frame. Rebel Wilson played herself. As mentioned there is not much comedy but she delivers some much needed laughs. Rebel is in a sex scene which I hope, God willing, I will forget someday.

This is a Michael Bay movie, which means the movie is formula driven. There are the cars crashes, steroid laced jocks, cigarette boats, explosions and of course live Barbies.  Yes, the Barbies were filled with silicon but they left a good impression.

See the movie. It is worth seeing the real bad guys in the ending credits. Yeah, they still look dumb.