MOVIE REVIEWS
The Marine
Jay Perry
Choo-choo! All aboard the clich train. Please have your boarding ticket in one hand and a case of cyanide pills in the other. Your conductor, WWE grappler John Cena, will be taking you on a yawn-inducing ride filled with loud noises, atrocious dialogue, and nauseating acting. At the conclusion of the ride, please swallow the entire case of your previously mentioned cyanide pills, as the painful life-lasting memories this ride creates will be too much to handle.
WWE Films is at it again, this time delivering a full-nelson body slam to a new genre: the action film. Chances are if you are reading this, you never sat through the first WWE Films installment: the shit-tastic horror romp “See No Evil”. The effects of watching that movie are similar to viewing the tape from “The Ring”, except that instead of dying in seven days, you immediately drop dead after the final scene (which consists of a dog urinating in the eye socket of the antagonist – I am not kidding.) Needless to say, a WWE Films production isn’t the most sophisticated piece of cinema you will find. This fact is further proven with their latest release: “The Marine”.
What you are about to read is the quickest synopsis of a full-length feature film in history. Somebody call Guiness because yours truly is about to break a record. Ready? Here we go:
A discharged Marine’s wife is captured by criminals and he tries to get her back.
That’s the entire story. There is no detailed back-story for any characters, no subplots, nothing. It’s 90-minutes of John Cena running through a swamp and punching the occasional bad guy.
John Cena has the acting ability of a metal trash can full of rocks. No, I’m sorry, that’s completely inaccurate: rocks can show more emotional range. Cena raises the bar for professional wrestlers who attempt to throw their hat into the cinema ring. You thought Hulk Hogan in “Mr. Nanny” or Bill Goldberg in “Santa’s Slay” were fucking awful? At least they could make a facial expression besides one that a kid makes when his puppy gets hit by a bus. Not to be outdone in the terrible performance department is Robert Patrick, who shows that he will do anything for money…ANYTHING. I mean, the only logical explanation for him to agree to sign-on to this cinematic abortion is that he spent all his “Terminator 2” money on Tijuana hookers and drug paraphernalia. Few actors, outside of an Uwe Boll film, have ever looked physically depressed when playing a role, but Robert Patrick tops them all. It’s like every time he is forced to recite a generic bad guy line such as “I’m in charge now!”, a little piece of him dies inside.
Speaking of generic lines, the dialogue in this movie is so pitiful, it makes every line you have heard from a Steven Seagal flick seem like it was written by Shakespeare himself. The dialogue contains too many awkward pauses and moments. I guarantee, if you are brave enough to see this movie, when one character reveals he was raped by his camp counselor dubbed “Johnny Whiplash” with some rock candy, the awkwardness that will fill the theater will be so intense, the entire building will combust. What is even more horrifying is that this screenplay took TWO people to write. I can only imagine how long it took co-writers Michelle Gallagher and Alan McElroy to orchestrate the scene where one character proclaims an abandoned shack smells like “Baked ass.” You know the writing is terrible when a simple scene like John Cena explaining a childhood memory of camping trips with his Dad is worded so poorly, it unintentionally (or maybe intentionally) implies that his Dad molested him on those cold nights in the tent.
I’m sure none of my comments come as a complete shock to you. This was billed as a dumb action movie, so the only element that matters is the action, right? Well, too bad it falls flat on its face like a Fidel Castro stage dive. The film substitutes expertly choreographed fight scenes with generic brawls filmed by a cameraman who appears to be getting electrocuted. Why filmmakers believe that the “shakey camera” effect compliments action films is beyond me. Not only is “shakey camera” syndrome present, but “The Marine” also unleashes a healthy dose of slow-motion running and bullet-time effects.
The only compliment I can give this film is that the female lead, Kelly Carlson, is very beautiful. Of course, the opportunity to marvel at her beauty is soon interrupted by a dumb ape with a crew cut trying to speak a line of dialogue that never exceeds 9 words (oh, and trust me, I counted).
Moral of the story: the money that went into making this film should have went somewhere else. The story is bland, the pacing is horrendous, I really could keep going, but I’ll stop. Director John Bonito couldn’t direct an elementary school play, never mind a 90-minute feature film. Is this the worst movie of the year? While it has some stiff competition, I ultimately believe that “The Marine” will stand tall amongst the few…the proud…the complete shit.
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