Dwayne Johnson is one of the biggest movie stars in the world. He’s a face you see everywhere, and he’s been in some of the biggest movie franchises of the modern day. Having said that, it’s difficult to argue that The Rock’s Hollywood career has become a bit stale. He plays a lot of very similar characters in a lot of very similar movies. Not so with his upcoming film The Smashing Machine.
The new movie comes from A24 and is written and directed by Benny Safdie. Those details alone are enough to make any movie stand up and pay attention, but they’re also not elements you expect to see associated with a Dwayne Johnson movie. The first trailer for the new film is now here, and not only is it unlike anything we’ve seen from Dwayne Johnson, but you can barely recognize him.
Dwayne Johnson Is Unrecognizable In The Smashing Machine
The Smashing Machine is the story of Mark Kerr, one of the first big stars of the Ultimate Fighting Championship, before it became the multibillion-dollar organization it is today. Johnson stars as Kern, reteaming with his Jungle Cruise co-star Emily Blunt as Kerr’s wife. While the movie looks to have its share of in-ring action, The Smashing Machine is about what happens outside the ring, and Dwayne Johnson looks incredible.
He’s also virtually unrecognizable. The makeup and prosthetics transform Johnson into Mark Kerr. The fact that Dwayne Johnson would even make a movie where he doesn’t look like Dwayne Johnson is in itself a radical act for the actor. His look is his brand, and his willingness to transform shows that Johnson is committed to making this movie something very different.
Dwayne Johnson Needed A Career Transformation, And This Could Be It
I’ve been a fan of Dwayne Johnson since he was rolling around with the Nation of Domination in WWE, and I’ve seen most, if not all, of his films to date. And I like them. It’s absolutely true that the most successful Dwayne Johnson movies, especially in recent years, have followed a near-identical formula, but that formula plays to Johnson’s strengths, and he makes it work. Dwayne Johnson movies aren’t challenging, but they’re almost always entertaining.
The Smashing Machine is clearly a conscious attempt by Dwayne Johnson to do something different. A biopic requires an actor to pretend to be somebody else in a way that playing other fictional characters doesn’t always require.
Johnson is challenging himself with this role. Based on the trailer, it looks like he may very well be up for the task. Even if he’s not, the attempt is a worthy one. I hope The Smashing Machine turns out to be one of the best Dwayne Johnson movies, but even if the movie isn’t perfect, or, more likely, it doesn’t make a billion dollars at the box office, I hope we see more roles from Dwayne Johnson like this. Not only could we get great performances from him, but when we see the next, more traditional “Dwayne Johnson movie,” they’ll feel special too.