Pain and Gain

The 2013 release "Pain and Gain" is a conundrum wrapped in an enigma. Overblown, overstylized and just overstupid for the majority of its overlong 2+ hour running time you'd think that "Pain and Gain" had a surefire slot in the worst films of the year list-but it doesn't. While there are almost too many flaws to count "Pain and Gain" is also laced with moments of pure brilliance that are both funny, uncomfortable and artistic, and yes I did just use the word "artistic" to describe a Michael Bay movie....

The director here, Michael Bay is best known for making big Hollywood blockbusters such as "Armageddon" "The Rock" and probably most notably the "Transformers" series among countless others. Bay over his career has been much maligned for making these "popcorn" flicks, some criticism warranted, some not. In my opinion if you need something blow'd up real good in your movie there is no one better to direct your movie. The problem here is that with "Pain and Gain" Bay is trying to make a Coen brothers movie in the vein of "Fargo" and he just doesn't have the skill set to pull it off. "Pain and Gain tells the story of three bodybuilders in Miami in the mid 90's who in order to gain social stature and money scheme a plan to kidnap a wealthy sandwich shop owner (this is a true story by the way) and torture him until he signs over all  his assets to them. The bodybuilders are played by Mark Wahlberg, Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson and Anthony Mackie. The performances here are another saving grace for the film, the three leads do what they can with the disjointed script which cant decide if it wants to be a dark comedy or a "point break" imitator. The supporting cast, for as good as it is pretty much is underused. Ed Harris must owe Bay a favor after "The Rock" because he just seems out of place here, Bay wants this to be a Coen brothers film so badly that he even cast Coen brother go to character actors Peter Stormare and Tony Shaloub.

"Pain and Gain" has been a passion project for Bay for years and on paper it should have worked. Gorgeous locations, fast cars, scantily clad women and explosions, these are all mandatory "Bayisms" in his movies. Unfortunately if you are trying to make a dark comedy/true crime story these elements have no place here, even in a story based in Miami. You cant just throw a random explosion in the middle of a Miami street or have 10 cops fire at you in a waterway during the day and expect people to take you seriously. The only reason the studio let Bay direct this is because he did sign on to helm "Transformers 4" for them which shows that "I'll scratch your back if you scratch mine" is indeed a real thing.

"Pain and Gain" is definitely worth the $1.23 Redbox will charge you but not much more than that. The real discovery here for me was the performance by "The Rock", having already mastered the action film genre it will be interesting if anyone gives Rock a shot at something with more substance. He shows in "Pain and Gain" that can play "cocaine" among the best I've seen, I'd love to see him in something like what Bruce Willis did in "Pulp Fiction". As for Bay I'm sure as long as he keeps chugging out movies that give Megan Fox a consistent income he'll be able to make one of these passion projects every few years, George Lucas did the same thing after he wrapped the Star Wars trilogies and looked how well that worked out for him...