OxfordPress.com

Verdict: A big, happy bruiser of a buddy movie.

By Bob Longino
(none)

The Rock can quit his day job.

In his energetic, funny and fleet-of-foot comedy-action film, “The Rundown,” pro wrestling's baddest bad boy proves that not only can he act, he's got the heft to carry a movie.

His sidekick is no slouch, either. Seann William Scott, fresh from stealing another “American Pie” movie as that series' obnoxious, full-of-himself Stifler, arrives in “Rundown” as a noisy goofball Jerry Lewis to Rock's ring-a-ding Dean-o.

Their rumble in the South American jungle makes them the most watchable buddy team on the big-screen since, well, Will Smith and Martin Lawrence.

In a way, that's really what “The Rundown” is — “Bad Boys II” on vacation.

Both movies boast wordy but meaningless plots, loudmouth leads, lots of bruising fights, a gorgeous girl (then it was Gabrielle Union, now it's Rosario Dawson) and a cinematographer with an itchy trigger finger.

From the get-go, “Rundown” director Peter Berg (he played Dr. Billy Kronk on “Chicago Hope”) sets his camera to moving and never stops. He's into 360 degree-camera turns, aerial zooms and constant tracking shots. His film editor never gets a rest either. Each quick cut is followed by a faster cut.

The story (do fans of this kind of action movie really need one?) has Rock as Beck, a behemoth of a bounty hunter sent to the big, wide Amazon jungle to find Travis (Scott), a treasure hunter. Once in South America, Beck finds Travis but also has to trade blows with Hatcher (Christopher Walken), the area's ultimate bossman.

Toss in a beautiful gal (trust me, Dawson never goes one second in this film's brutal weather without face-saving moisturizer), tiny locals with a knack for terrorizing outsiders and a pack of angry monkeys and you've got yourself a movie.

Walken is as over-the-top as you'd want. One of his more outlandish speeches involves using the tooth fairy as a metaphor to locals who have obviously never heard of the tooth fairy.

Little of this movie is memorable artistic filmmaking. “Rundown” is all gags, put-downs and furious fisticuffs. Very little seems real. Our heroes can fall off a steep mountainside, pound through the brush, hit trees hard enough to break them and not bust a single bone.

But it is entertaining.

Really, “Rundown” is nothing more than cinematic soup. A little “Indiana Jones,” a dash of “The Magnificent Seven” and a big, big gulp of “Bad Boys.”

You can watch it, enjoy it, have a few good laughs — and never think about it again.