Who would have thought that underneath all those orange filters, Michael Bay had a comedic side to him. Sure there were a few funny throw-away lines in movies like "Armageddon". Most of those are because Owen Wilson could read the phonebook (wonder when that phrase is going to become too antiquated to make sense) and make me laugh. For every decent joke he has in a movie, he has racist jive-talking robots like in the second "Transformers" film or a car chase that involves dead bodies being thrown out of a moving car to stop our heroes. Not only did we not know that Bay had a comedic side but even a DARKLY comedic side. While "Pain and Gain" is not on par with the dark comedy work of directors like the Coen Brothers or David Fincher, it is still a very interesting and mostly daring comedy that in the hands of another director would have gotten the attention it deserves.
Daniel Lugo (Mark Wahlberg) is in a rut. He works every day at a fitness club helping out-of-shape people to better themselves. What Lugo really wants is to make his own life better. He wants the American dream. His dream is usually caked in false nostalgia or perceived needs. An impressive lawn-mower becomes a goal for him. Unfortunately, personal trainers don't make the money needed for expensive lawn-mowers and the dreams that follow after them. Lugo hatches a plan with fellow body-builders Adrian (Anthony Mackie) and Doyle (Dwayne Johnson) to extort money from one of his rich clients (Tony Shalhoub). It seems that all that HGH has fired their brains though as they discover that lifting weights doesn't quite make them ready for a life of crime.
Wahlberg again proves that he is a comedic actor. The role where he shined the most was in 2004's "I Heart Huckabees" where he played a bike-riding eccentric firemen. He brings some of that same manic energy to his portrayal of Lugo. It is very believable (unfortunately) that Wahlberg could be a dumb jock who thinks he is far smarter than he is. It is Johnson's portrayal of Doyle that is truly inspired though. Every scene with Doyle, a born-again Christian with a heart of gold and a fist of lead, is hilarious. Johnson has reached the point in his comedic acting where he doesn't even necessarily need to say anything in order to elicit a laugh from the audience. Here he plays one of his darkest and dimmest characters. This film would be very lost without his performance which might be the funniest character we've seen on screen in some time.
Bay's direction is not without its short-comings though. This is a 130-minute movie where if they had played the gratuitous slow-motion shots at full speed we would be looking at a sub-2 hour film. Bay has always had a difficult time simply putting the images on screen in an interesting way versus smashing it over our heads with "style". Some editing and turning down the "style" knob from "8" (which is still better than Bay's usual "11+") to a "5" would have really helped. Any comedy that is considering hiring Ken Jeong for a role needs to simply stop and cut the character. Here he plays a self-help guru who is considering funny simply because he is vulgar. This character has been done time-and-time again and most of the time it is Jeong behind it.
While "Pain and Gain" will never be confused with the works of the Coens, it is a sometimes sharp and interesting and almost always hilarious dark comedy. It is a shame that many people will automatically be turned off to the film based on the name above the title. If you can get past Bay's "explosive" tendencies (only one car blows up and it isn't even that large of an explosion!) you might be in for a treat. At the very least, we are seeing Wahlberg and Johnson do what they do best.
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