So begins Michael Bay's small, personal, deeply felt film about large men, drugs, lamborghinis, explosions, and sex toys. It takes a rare director to bestow something like this on the world, and frame the critical conversation around it being a palette cleanser between Transformers flicks. Ah well, the bounds of good taste have never been an impediment to Bay, so why start now? What I will say is that the film has a certain shaggy, good natured appeal. It isn't as agressively ugly as most of his ouvre, and Bay's camera follows his characters with a bemused affection.
And, oddly enough, there's a germ of a good idea rolling around in here somewhere. Bay is interested in the nature of work and entrepeneurship, and especially in the competitive root of capitalism. We all take it for granted that businesses big and small commit morally questionable acts in the pursuit of profit. I think we can also agree that many laws of this great nation are arbitrary constructions of history and convention (note: I am NOT advocating kidnapping people and stealing their property). So where do we draw the line? What is an acceptable strategy for getting ahead in the world?
We celebrate, and rightly so, creators who introduce disruptive ideas, dream big and relentlessly pursue every goal. How is Daniel Lugo different? Well, first off, he's an idiot. There's nothing particularly new or disruptive about the concepts of kidnapping and blackmail. There's an interesting thread running through the movie, showing that the theoretical antagonist (calling someone a "hero" or "villiain" in this cast is just silly), Victor Kershaw is actually the smartest, hardest-working character in the place. At one point, in a classic rant that Tony Shaloub delivers with scorn dripping from every word, he explains something of how he rose to his wealth and influence, and all the reasons that Lugo will never be able to suceed on that level. He's right. An asshole, but he's right.
Lugo & company fail because they aren't trying to create anything. They're observing a ruthless, intelligent, businessman, and trying to get rich by adopting the first quality without using the second. That never works. There's an old saying that if you don't like the leaderboard, just change the game. The Sun Gym Gang isn't changing anything. They're just trying to cheat, and they're terrible at it. Of all the things I expected when sitting down to watch a Bay joint, sound business advice would never have been on the list.
Look, Pain and Gain is not a good movie, even grading on the curved surface of all the fireballs in the Michael Bay canon. It's too long, wildly misogynistic, gleefully juvenile. But the acting is stellar, especially from Dwayne Johnson, who has rarely been this relaxed and self-mockingly playful, and a scenery-shredding Tony Shaloub. Bay remains a dynamic and exciting craftsman, intoxicated by the power of bodies in motion and the roar of engines across crystalline waters. Interestingly, the constraints of a lower budget (fewer cameras, little-to-no cgi), seem to free the director from some of his more spastic tendencies. The film is visually coherent and spatially aware, and seems more-or-less certain of where everyone is in relation to everyone else at any one time. There's also a degree of male fetishism on display here that verges on the meta. I almost wonder if Bay, who has frequently and correctly been accused of using his female characters in a way that borders on the pornographic, is thumbing his nose at the audience, just a little. Listening to him in interviews, it's apparent that Bay is much like the movies he directs; Big, lound and brash, but intelligent and self-aware in a way that makes one hesitant to dismiss him. I've long thought that he's capable of directing a great movie, even if he hasn't gotten around to it just yet. Consider this one evidence for the defense.
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