It sounds like a movie lover’s dream come true: Rocky vs. the Raging Bull; Stallone vs. De Niro. Two heavyweight champions of American cinema going toe-to-toe in the boxing ring. How could this not be fun? How could this not be cool? I’ll tell you how: when it’s “Grudge Match,” a punishingly punch-drunk studio comedy which pits Sylvester Stallone and Robert De Niro against each other and somehow manages to make that a drag to sit through. I was kind of impressed: who knew Jake LaMotta calling Rocky Balboa a “super pussy” could be so boring?
In “Grudge Match,” they play Henry “Razor” Sharp (Sly) and Billy “The Kid” McDonnen (De Niro), a couple of old Pittsburgh boxing rivals whose fierce rivalry came to a bitter end when Henry quit the sport before their final fight in the early ‘80s. Since retired and no longer on speaking terms, they’re unwittingly reunited by a promoter (Kevin Hart) who offers them a deal: one last fight, a grudge match he calls it, for a few big bucks. They accept and the “Rocky”-style training montages begin — with added old-man jokes! Meanwhile, Henry reunites with an old flame played by Kim Basinger and Billy reunites with his estranged son, played by Jon Bernthal.
Those last two sub-plots are mere distractions used to pad out the runtime: though it’s always nice to see Kim Basinger on the big screen, we know what we’re really here for, and that’s Stallone punching De Niro in the face, and vice versa. We do get that for the film’s final 20 minutes, and though that final fight is kinda fun when it finally arrives it’s not worth the tedious slog that is the film’s first hour and a half. Stallone and De Niro’s natural charms, still present even when they’re phoning it in, can’t make up for such pitifully lightweight gags, nor a script that sounds like it was written by a six year old — I mean super pussy, really?
Rating: 4/10
No comments:
Post a Comment