Dwayne Johnson steps into a different kind of fighting ring in The Smashing Machine, a biopic covering the life and career of early UFC champion and MMA pioneer Mark Kerr. Johnson’s career in the WWE as one of the best-known professional wrestlers of all time inevitably invites comparisons to the real-life fighter he’s portraying and he certainly looks the part. Even compared to his typical action movie physique, Johnson has clearly put on even more muscle than he normally sports to convey Kerr’s domineering stature. He’s not an actor known for particularly nuanced performances and, perhaps by default, this is some of his best work, juxtaposing Kerr’s brutality in the ring with a soft-spokeness and vulnerability outside it. The film is strong showcase for his talents but never quite establishes itself as anything more than that.
The Smashing Machine tracks 3 years of Kerr’s MMA career, beginning in 1997 with Vale Tudo (literally Portuguese for “Everything Goes”) fighting in Brazil. His ruthless combat style draws the attention of UFC tournament winner Mark Coleman (Ryan Bader), who invites him to compete in several bouts for the organization. Looking for an opportunity to make more money, Kerr goes to Japan with his girlfriend Dawn (Emily Blunt) to fight for Pride Fighting Championships instead. The bloodthirsty battles there cause him to increase his dependency on opioids to numb the constant pain in which he finds himself. After a nearly lethal overdose, Kerr has to reconcile his dream of being a mixed martial arts legend with the massive toll that it’s taken on his personal life.
The Smashing Machine is the solo directing and writing film debut of Benny Safdie, half of the filmmaking duo responsible for anxiety-inducing crime thrillers like Good Time and Uncut Gems. This movie could take half of the urgency of those films and still be captivating but even outside the comparison, the storytelling here is stodgy and sedate. There’s even less of an excuse for that to be the case, given how much is adapted from a 2002 documentary of the same name covering the same stretch of time in Kerr’s career. It would be one thing to use the doc as a jumping-off point to further develop a dramatization but there are numerous scenes literally taken verbatim from the existing material. That the HBO Documentary Film is a bit tricky to track down — it isn’t currently available on any major streaming platform, including HBO Max — may be enough reason to include so much of it word-for-word in this fictionalized version, but the approach nevertheless feels unimaginative.
The augmentations that Benny Safdie applies to The Smashing Machine from its source material — the complete title of the documentary is The Smashing Machine: The Life and Times of Extreme Fighter Mark Kerr — primarily focus on the relationship between Kerr and his girlfriend Dawn. Dwayne Johnson and Emily Blunt certainly do what they can in front of the camera to bolster what’s on the page but both are ultimately hindered by underwritten roles. It’s curious that Safdie would choose to expand Dawn’s presence in his telling of the story if he didn’t have much compelling or original to say about her as a character. Another angle that could have potentially yielded more fruitful results is amplifying the depiction of Mark Coleman’s personal and professional relationship with Kerr. Ryan Bader is an MMA competitor in real life and even with limited screen time, he gives a naturalistic and, at times, magnetic performance.
Admittedly, I went into The Smashing Machine dreading what I figured would be little more than Dwayne Johnson prepping his Oscar reel. No matter this film’s critical or commercial reception, I expect him to campaign hard in the coming months for the Academy Award he seems to covet desperately. Save a few interesting choices here and there, he’s played things extremely safe when it comes to role selection since hitting the silver screen for the first time almost 25 years ago. Perhaps I shouldn’t be so cynical about his attempt to branch out here and engage with more fulfilling character work. Whether the choice was made mainly for accolade purposes or not, Johnson assuredly does some of the best acting of his career in The Smashing Machine. The movie around him isn’t as rock solid in its execution but it’s a suitable fill-in until the superior documentary surfaces again.
Score – 3/5
New movies coming this weekend:
Playing in theaters is Tron: Ares, a sci-fi action movie starring Jared Leto and Greta Lee, following a highly sophisticated program who is sent from the digital world into the real world on a dangerous mission, marking humankind’s first encounter with A.I. beings.
Also coming to theaters is Roofman, a crime dramedy starring Channing Tatum and Kirsten Dunst, telling the true story of a charismatic criminal who hides on the roof of a toy store and adopts a new identity while on the run from the police.
Premiering on Netflix is The Woman In Cabin 10, a psychological thriller starring Keira Knightley and Guy Pearce, about a journalist covering the maiden voyage of a luxury cruise ship who is convinced she has witnessed a passenger be thrown overboard.
Reprinted by permission of Whatzup