Movie Review: Rampage

Rampage *** / *****

Directed by: Brad Peyton.

Written by: Ryan Engle and Carlton Cuse & Ryan J. Condal and Adam Sztykiel and Ryan Engle.

Starring: Dwayne Johnson (Davis Okoye), Naomie Harris (Dr. Kate Caldwell), Malin Åkerman (Claire Wyden), Jeffrey Dean Morgan (Agent Russell), Jake Lacy (Brett Wyden), Joe Manganiello (Burke), Marley Shelton (Dr. Kerry Atkins), P. J. Byrne (Nelson), Demetrius Grosse (Colonel Blake), Jack Quaid (Connor), Breanne Hill (Amy).

 

It takes a special set of skills to make a movie as gloriously dumb as Rampage undeniably is, but still make it fun. Not everyone can do it right- as the recent Pacific Rim: Uprising proved, which was just as big and dumb as this film is, but isn’t half as much fun. Rampage is a film based on an arcade game which (apparently, I never played it) was nothing except a giant gorilla, a giant wolf and a giant alligator destroying buildings – and the film knows precisely what it is that people who pay to see a movie with that concept want to see – mainly a giant gorilla, giant wolf and a giant alligator destroying buildings. The movie doesn’t really try that hard to have the emotional underpinnings of Peter Jackson’s version of King Kong (it pays it some lip service, but basically doesn’t care), and doesn’t have the larger implications of Gareth Edwards’ Godzilla (a film I still love, screw you, you’re wrong about that one). It’s essentially a hundred minutes of smashy-smashy, with enough material with an entirely game cast so you can say that yes, there is in fact a plot here.

 

And what a gloriously dumb plot is it! Malin Akerman is Claire Wyden, who runs a huge company based in Chicago, who as we see in the opening scene, is conducting genetic editing tests on rats in space, until one of those rats becomes a giant killer rat, and kills almost everyone on board. One lucky scientist manages to get to the escape capsule in time, only to die as she crashes to earth, with three of the samples flying free and hurtling to earth – landing next to (you guessed it) a gorilla, a wolf and an alligator, turning them into monsters. The only one of the three giant animals we care about is George – the Gorilla – who lives at the San Diego Wildlife Centre, under the watch of Davis Okoye (Dwayne Johnson), a former specialist forces army man, who is also a former head of the UN anti-poaching team, and is now head primatologist. He and George are friends – they speak in sign language, and joke around – so when George starts getting bigger – and angrier – all of a sudden, he is concerned. Eventually, he’ll meet Dr. Kate Caldwell (Naomie Harris), who used to work for Wyden and knows about their research, and Agent Russell (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) – who works for Other Government Agency – to try and figure out what’s going on. For reasons having to do with perhaps the dumbest villain plot ever conceived, all three animals make their way to Chicago – where eventually, they will lay waste to half the city.

 

Now, not everyone can act in a film like Rampage – and make it work. I’m thinking of someone like Charlize Theron – probably a better actor than anyone in Rampage, but who really seemed out of place in the last Fast & Furious movie, probably because she took it too seriously. That’s not a mistake anyone in Rampage makes. Dwayne Johnson is one of the best actors around for these type of movie star roles, that require nothing more than for him to be charming and funny, and occasionally kick ass – and he does that wonderfully well. Everyone else kind of follows his lead – the more talented than needed Naomie Harris is fine, but you do get the feel that she’s just there to have another woman in the cast. Malin Akerman is having glorious amounts of fun being an evil woman. No one is better than Jeffrey Dean Morgan though, who says every line almost as if he’s about to break out laughing because of how stupid it all is. It’s a skill he perfected on The Walking Dead, where Negan speaks in catch phrases and declarations that are asinine, but at least in this, the film knows that.

 

But what you really want to see is those three animals destroy things – and once they get started, boy do they ever destroy things. The director is Brad Peyton, who teamed up with Johnson for San Andreas a few years ago, so you already know he’s great at destroying cities (also, he seems oddly fascinated with helicopters). Yes, you could certainly argue that this is another blockbuster that destroys cities, evokes 9/11 with its imagery, but doesn’t seriously consider the human lives lost in the film (they say that half of downtown has been evacuated when they animals start smashing – that still leaves I have no idea how many tens of thousands of people dead). But the film is so goofy, you’re not really thinking about that, are you?

 

No one could seriously argue that Rampage is a great film – or even a good one. If you watch it and say it’s the dumbest thing you’ve ever seen, well, I’m not sure I could mount much of a defense to that. But the film is glorious amounts of fun.