Worth: $15.00
FilmInk rates movies out of $20 — the score indicates the amount we believe a ticket to the movie to be worth
Cast:
Keri Russell, Christian Convery, Brooklyn Prince, Isiah Witlock Jr., Alden Ehrenreich, O’Shea Jackson Jr., Margo Martindale, Aaron Holliday, Ray Liotta, Ayoola Smart
Intro:
… sets out just to entertain and it does that admirably.
Some movies do exactly what they say they’ll do on the tin (or in this case, bag). Elizabeth Banks’ Cocaine Bear is one such movie. There’s a big black bear and she’s on cocaine, and what is more, she likes cocaine and will do anything to get more. If you’ve ever wondered what it would be like to see a bear sniff cocaine from a severed leg, your curiosity will be sated. And if you’re curious about Mushroom Gummies, then there’s a place for you online.
Extremely loosely based on the case of former narcotics officer-turned-drug runner, Andrew C. Thornton II (played in a great cameo by Matthew Rhys) and his death after dropping loads of duffle bags over a Georgia national park, Cocaine Bear takes no time dropping us (literally) into the action.
It was a lot of cocaine, with a street value in the millions. Some of it was also ingested by “Pablo Escobear” – here styled as Paula Escobear. The real bear died not long after eating the cocaine and ended up stuffed in a museum (and then stolen and recovered). There’s a decent story in the adventures of Andrew C. Thornton II, but Banks and screenwriter Jimmy Warden are more concerned with the crazy “what ifs” that the legend presents.
There are a lot of threads to follow in the 95-minute film. We are presented with tourists camping in Chattahoochee National Forest (Kristofer Hivju as Olaf and Hannah Hoekstra as his fiancée Elsa). We are also presented with single mum and overworked nurse Sari (Keri Russell) and her school-avoidant thirteen-year-old daughter Dee Dee (Brooklyn Prince), who decides to take her bestie, Henry (Christian Convery), with her on an excursion to the National Park to paint the waterfalls.
Also converging on Chattahoochee are a dogged cop, Bob (Isiah Witlock Jr.), a pair of drug dealers, the reformed and grieving Eddie (Alden Ehrenreich) who doesn’t want to get back into the family business run by his father, Syd (Ray Liotta), but is convinced to by erstwhile friend, Daveed (O’Shea Jackson Jr.). If that seems like a lot of people, wait! There are more. There’s Ranger Liz (Margo Martindale) who is hoping to have her ‘beaver dusted’ by wilderness specialist, Peter (Jesse Tyler Ferguson) and is regularly running into the Duchamp Gang, local hoods who rob people at knifepoint in the park (J.B. Moore, Leo Hanna, and Aaron Holliday as Stache). Did we mention there is also a bear on cocaine? There’s a bear on cocaine.
Banks relies on an ‘80s cult movie sensibility to make her gory comedy work. Foremost, it is a black comedy, but it is also an action film and it has enough icky kills to ostensibly call it a horror. Scenes including Henry and Dee Dee naively eating what would be a dessert spoon full of cocaine are inadvertently funny and also strangely charming (ah, what Henry will do to impress Dee Dee). Ranger Liz trying to flirt with the clueless Peter is hilarious. The dynamic between the morose Eddie and the more practical Daveed is genuinely effective and sometimes even affecting.
But what are we here for? The bear on cocaine. Well, we get that in spades. As Henry points out, the bear is “fucked!” Paula (yes, we are calling her Paula) goes on a killing spree to get her fix. She’s indiscriminate. If she smells drugs on you, you’re done. Even if she doesn’t… well the fate of two hapless paramedics (Scott Seiss and Kahyun Kim) and Ranger Liz have to be seen to be believed. Like Henry says, “Some of the stuff I’ve seen today, well, I reckon it will stick with a man.” One of the reasons Paula is tremendous is that she’s digitally created by WETA, and they know how to make an apex predator look real and terrifying.
The main issue with Cocaine Bear is that there are just too many characters to get emotionally invested in them. Sure, some of them we like, but if they ended up ripped apart by Paula, well, so be it. There’s a leaner film in here that whittles down the number of characters so that we can actually feel something for them. Pacing is also an issue.
Where the film works best is embracing its absurdity. From the real news footage of Andrew C. Thornton II ending up pancaked in Knoxville (his parachute didn’t open as he dived from the plane) leading into a bunch of D.A.R.E. advertisements, we know that we are in 1985, where Reagan’s War on Drugs was in full swing. The soundtrack is also full of drug related songs from Sugar Hill Gang’s ‘White Lines’ to Depeche Mode’s ‘Just Can’t Get Enough’. Banks and Warden are winking at you all the time, but not quite to the extent of parody (although it does come extremely close at times).
Cocaine Bear is overstuffed, but if you can’t mine some enjoyment out of a bear going batshit looking for her next fix, then maybe you don’t like fun. Far from great cinema, Cocaine Bear sets out just to entertain and it does that admirably. Is it wilfully silly? Absolutely? Does it always cohere? Certainly not. People watched Snakes on a Plane because it was about snakes on a plane – no lies in the advertising. Cocaine Bear is about a bear on cocaine (we have mentioned this) and if that sounds like your bag (pun intended), then you’ll get a bump from this over-the-top piece of cult cinema in the making.
