What is it?
Cocaine Bear is inspired (very loosely) on the true story of some cocaine smugglers who dumped their drugs out of a plane after running into engine issues. The cocaine fell into a wilderness area where some of it was found by a bear who promptly ate it, and then just as promptly died from an overdose (don't do drugs, bears!).
This movie takes that initial idea and instead of the bear dying immediately, turns it into a coke fiend who just can't get enough of the stuff, and goes on a bit of a rampage.
Caught up in the action are two kids skipping school, their mother trying to find them, some low level criminals trying to recover all the drugs, a park ranger and her crush, some local ruffians and a few extra characters here an there.
Quick Review
This movie is very obviously trying to be a meme, but it really feels like it's trying super hard to become one. Instead of being a 'so bad it's good' movie, for me, it just ends up being bad.
Every character in this is playing an over-the-top cartoon character of a person, saying dialogue that just felt weird and like no one in real life would talk. Especially the young boy character, and through no fault of the actor, but all of hi dialogue just felt unrealistic.
But in contrast to that, there were all these "serious" parts to the story, like Keri Russell's mum character trying to find her lost daughter and having issues because she's dating a new man and her daughter doesn't like it. And Alden Ehrenreich's character having some serious depression and abandoning his kid to his crazy grandfather, Ray Liotta. The movie couldn't decide if it was going to be a crazy over the top massacre romp, or a Jaws-like horror with personal stakes for the characters.
And then finally the bear was barely in it (pun intended). I mean, it was there, but it wasn't doing much of a coke rampage. It mostly grabbed people from the shadows/off-camera and then disappeared and was mostly focused on finding more cocaine to eat, or in one case, snort a line, which was a funny moment amongst many not funny ones.
There is one sequence about halfway through the movie where two paramedics who were called arrive to help the park ranger (character actress Margo Martindale) and the over the top action, comedy and gore was actually amazing. But it wasn't kept up through the rest of the movie so unfortunately for most of it, I was pretty bored.
I couldn't tell who the main character was because they kept jumping around and focusing on different people and the "final villain" felt like they were just thrown in there because the movie needed someone to die at the end and didn't want any of the "main characters" to be killed. Some of them definitely had some serious plot armour.
I can compare this to last year's Beast, starring Idris Elba where he fought a crazy lion and that was a much better creature/monster movie. Unfortunately, trying to manufacture a meme movie just doesn't work. For me at least. A few other people in the screening I was with really loved it!
See it or skip it?
Skip it.
Check out the Cocaine Bear trailer below.
- Matt
The Details
Inspired by the 1985 true story of a drug runner's plane crash, missing cocaine, and the black bear that ate it, this wild thriller finds an oddball group of cops, criminals, tourists and teens converging in a Georgia forest where a 500- pound apex predator has ingested a staggering amount of cocaine and gone on a coke-fueled rampage for more blow … and blood.
Cocaine Bear stars Keri Russell (The Americans), Emmy winner Margo Martindale (The Americans), Emmy winner Ray Liotta (The Many Saints of Newark), Alden Ehrenreich (Solo: A Star Wars Story), O’Shea Jackson Jr. (Straight Outta Compton), Jesse Tyler Ferguson (Modern Family), Kristofer Hivju (Game of Thrones), Kahyun Kim (American Gods), Christian Convery (Sweet Tooth), Brooklynn Prince (The Florida Project) and newcomer Scott Seiss.
Directed by Elizabeth Banks (Charlie’s Angels, Pitch Perfect 2) from a screenplay by Jimmy Warden (The Babysitter: Killer Queen), Cocaine Bear is produced by Oscar® winners Phil Lord and Chris Miller (Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse, The Mitchells vs. The Machines) and Aditya Sood (The Martian) for Lord Miller, by Elizabeth Banks and Max Handelman (Pitch Perfect franchise) for Brownstone Productions, and by Brian Duffield (Spontaneous). Robin Fisichella (Ma) will executive produce.