The Smashing Machine (2025)
Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson has been garnering Oscar buzz for his portrayal of MMA pioneer Mark Kerr in writer/director Benny Safdie's new biopic The Smashing Machine. While the movie is interesting at times, it does not soar to the level of Oscar-worthy.
At the start of the film, Kerr is an
undefeated MMA fighter with unmatched grappling skills in the late 1990s when
the sport did not have the following it does today and the paychecks were not
as big. Kerr also has a hidden opioid problem and is in a tempestuous marriage
with Dawn (Emily Blunt). Soon, Kerr's substance abuse becomes unhidden after he
takes a vicious beating in the ring. When he emerges from rehab, he tries to
make a comeback.
The film tries to take on several
things at once. It's a sports movie, a movie about addiction, and a movie about
a dysfunctional marriage. While some individual scenes work well and Johnson
does a good job as Kerr, the whole just never comes together. It doesn't have
the visceral emotional punch of the best sports movies, and its examination of
the marriage is undermined by Dawn's character being undeveloped. There's
nothing wrong with Blunt's performance, but the audience just does not learn
much about her character other than she's an emotional roller coaster and
fights with Kerr a lot. While the film's finale can be commended for shirking
cliches often seen in sports movies, of both the uplifting and depressing
varieties, it unfortunately feels a tad anticlimactic.
The Smashing Machine is by no
means a bad film, but it does not quite live up to the Oscar buzz that
accompanied its release.
