Rampage

The ongoing director-actor partnership between Brad Peyton and Dwayne Johnson continues to prove useful in giving audiences exactly what they're expecting. This is now their third join-up, each at interesting points of The Rock's career. 

The best of these is easily San Andreas, a highly underrated and gonzo disaster movie that I will still defend today. Unfortunately, but not all that unexpected, Rampage doesn't quite match the level of personal enjoyment I got from the earthquake flick though it does signify an awesome and somewhat exciting trend. 

Within less than a month we've received 2 (two!) dare I say "good" videogame films, each of which have mostly tried to be something more than just worthless nonsense *cough still upset about Assassin's Creed cough cough*. 

For comparison's sake I probably enjoyed Rampage a tad more than Tomb Raider outside of the exciting and pitch perfect performance from Vikander in the latter. And if we're being completely fair, Rampage has already been outdone in a way by this year's Pacific Rim: Uprising when it comes to monster mashing.

But where Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson goes, a good time is often to follow. As I've stated many times before, I'm a big fan of Johnson and his work ethic and care for his products. I think he and his team take the time to think critically and strategically about how they can add something special to each film and in Rampage the focus there is certainly on the relationship between him and one of the monsters -- something that's not remotely suggested in the actual videogame. His natural charisma and good will take him a long way, but it's often his industry tactics that take him to the next level (and is a good reason why he's the highest paid actor currently). 

When did The Rock grow all his hair back?

Rampage is a film where you get exactly what you're expecting, and perhaps something a bit better if you enter with some videogame-adaptation-cynicism (VAC -- it's a real disease). There's a dose of heart to it, there are some quips delivered with a sly smirk, and of course there's destruction and monsters. At the end of the day, the film is fairly forgettable since it doesn't bring anything new to the table, but forgettable doesn't always mean that the trip wasn't fun. In order to get to the monster destruction of the basically plot-less 80s videogame, we're introduced to Johnson's primate specialist, Davis Okoye who has a special bond with likely the world's only albino gorilla, George. George interacts with some research that has crashed back to earth and begins experiencing changes in aggression and size. The ex-scientist from the corporation that developed the technology, Naomie Harris, enters the picture to help and the race is on to Chicago in an effort to get the antidote. Yeah, the film's plot is silly but I'm not sure anyone was expecting otherwise. I did find that it meandered for a while before actually setting Chicago as its destination and it probably could have done some work to trim down closer to a short and sweet 90 minute runtime. 

Johnson and the gorilla actually have some great chemistry given that one of them is fake and I kind of viewed the gorilla similar to what Johnson would be like in real life if he were an actual gorilla (I'm sure he'd take that as a compliment). George, with the use of sign language (which has been prominently featured in movies this month!) has a personality and a "sick sense of humor" that does lend itself to some laughs. Harris and Johnson get along well too, though she truly doesn't add much to the film outside of moving the plot forward with her knowledge. Looking back I can't quite put my finger on it, but she feels wasted. Jeffrey Dean Morgan takes a break from playing bad guy Negan on The Walking Dead to come play good guy Negan in Rampage and goes a long way in justifying the "small doses" argument I made about Negan when I still actually watched the show. He starts off as somewhat captivating here but by the time the end of the film comes, the whole schtick is so old and I was just wanting him to deliver his dialogue in a speed greater than a drunken drawl.

Probably the only way you could get me to watch The Walking Dead again:
have Johnson join the cast

The film leads to an unsurprising showdown in a city, Chicago this time, with plenty of destruction. One of the places where I was most pleasantly surprised with Rampage was oddly enough its action and violence. In the time before Chicago, it has a very Jurassic Park feel and features some rather grisly images and deaths, surprising and bold for a film that's arguably aimed at a younger audience. After all these years of getting city destruction as collateral damage, it says something that I still enjoyed myself with Rampage's version of it and it didn't go on for too long into the realm of boring destruction porn. The monsters and effects look damn great most of the time which makes the fighting all that much more exciting and the "deaths" are similarly gruesome to some of the humans they dispatched before. 

The wolf has the power to spontaneously combust? WOW!

Rampage was missing that certain "something" that I found in San Andreas (although I know a lot of other people did not) but it's still a film that can be marked as a solid win for The Rock, and I commend he and his team for making an actual good videogame movie by taking the time to try and add that special something where so many have ignored before. 

CONS

• Could have trimmed its middle section a bit
• Not as funny as I was hoping it would be -- seems like a lost opportunity
• Naomie Harris does fine, but feels wasted
• Meanwhile, Jeffrey Dean Morgan is overused to the point of annoyance. Film could have saved time here too by limiting his dialogue
• About as predictable as you'd predict it to be :-) 

PROS

• Johnson can lead a film and he does so with ease here. Almost seems too easy by this point
• The relationship that George and Davis share is unique and adds that special element to the film. It's here we get some hearty laughs too
• Strong special effects
• Despite the fact we've seen it before, Rampage has some good action and violence, and was a bit more gruesome than I would have expected
• The final battle doesn't overstay its welcome and is well-orchestrated
• Fun, though forgettable, but that's more than you can say for a lot of videogame adaptations

Rath's Review Score | 7/10