Movie Review: Pain & Gain
MOVIE REVIEW: It can often hurt to watch Pain & Gain. This is not an intentional irony on the part of the filmmakers.
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MOVIE REVIEW: It can often hurt to watch Pain & Gain. This is not an intentional irony on the part of the filmmakers.
Especially when you learn one of those filmmakers is director Michael Bay. Yep, the man who gave the world the Transformers movies.
Mercifully, there are no shapeshifting robots to be seen in Pain & Gain. Instead, the frame is packed with buff and boneheaded bodybuilders. They're ripped, they're raging on the 'roids, and they're as bright as a brick.
Inspired by a sordid series of events that played out down Florida way, this distractingly erratic farce sometimes assumes the form of a GoodFellas for Dummies. At other times, it's Get Shorty for the short-attention-spanned.
Mark Wahlberg stars as Daniel, a small-time gym instructor looking for a ticket to the big time. What Daniel lacks in intelligence, he more than makes up for with drive. There's just one problem. The wonky steering on that drive keeps pointing in the wrong direction.
Such as when he comes up with a stupendously doomed get-rich-quick scheme certain to send all involved to an early grave or the nearest jail.
It starts with the straightforward kidnapping of a two-bit tycoon (Tony Shalhoub), gets bent out of shape by a few counts of attempted murder, then escalates to a few actual murders.
Despite coming up with one bad idea after another, Daniel remains the brains of the outfit. Once you meet that outfit (led by Dwayne Johnson, quite funny as a conflicted, coke-addicted Christian), you will realise "brains" is a relative term.
The fact these grisly incidents (sort of) actually occurred buys Pain &Gain some time on a curiosity level.
A small handful of stunning stand-alone scenes hint a better, bigger picture might have been in the offing, but director Bay has other, lesser ideas.
> PAIN & GAIN [MA15+]
Rating: 2/5
Director: Michael Bay (Transformers)
Starring: Mark Wahlberg, Dwayne Johnson, Tony Shalhoub, Ed Harris, Rebel Wilson
"No gain. Mostly pain."
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