Pain & Gain - Noodles Review

4 out of 10 Noodles

         Sorry I wasn't able to post much recently; I've been preoccupied in other affairs. However, this movie isn't really much to wait for. I went into this movie hoping it would be Michael Bay's redemption. His early movies, The Rock and Bad Boys, were fun and actually good movies. Then he completely lost his shit. I was cool with the first Transformers movies, but the second made me lose all hope. Anyways, I really liked the first trailers for Pain & Gain. They made me feel like this would actually be a fun and stylish movie. However, their ads literally have hashtags in them. "#GetBig" made me immediately like this movie less before seeing it; but I still went in with an open mind. Regardless, I was still disappointed.
        Mark Wahlberg is obviously the star of this movie. He's fine as an actor but his character is so difficult and stupid to identify with. And it's hard to identify with any of the characters in this movie because it's so unfocused. There's inner monologue for Wahlberg's character and that's fine, but then there turns out to be inner monologue for a plethora of other characters. Now the movie has no focus and you can't really follow it or relate to anyone. Dwayne Johnson was kinda likable in this movie because he tries to act innocent, but he gets annoying sometimes. Regardless, he's a good actor but if we have to talk about the acting, I'd say Ed Harris is the best in the movie, and so is his character. That being said, there's not much else to really like in the movie.

        Michael Bay, one of my least favorite directors, tries to go for a weird type of style in this movie. The whole movie is saturated on blast, the colors are popping out at your face in extreme contrast. It's really annoying after the first couple minutes. I would be okay if they used that for a specific scene to make it interesting, but it's forced throughout the movie. Another thing forced is the comedy of the movie. I'll admit I did laugh some times, but the movie isn't really that funny to be memorable. I can't really think of anything memorable from this movie; and the funniness really isn't one. And one big issue with this is that it actually happened. These guys went out and tortured, murdered, and stole from people (not too long ago either); and they make it as a comedy in which the criminals are the characters you're suppose to follow and root for. And sometimes it gets so over the top that the movie literally tries reminding you that it's still a true story (literally, it says "this is still a true story"). I'm okay with comedy, I'm okay with style, and I'm okay with fun movies. But I'm not okay with Michael Bay. And I'm not okay with how this movie is blended together. 4 out of 10 Noodles.