If Charlie's Angels was viewed as some kind of setback for the progress of Elizabeth Banks' directorial career, Cocaine Bear is the movie where any lingering doubts over her directorial ability promptly go out the window. Not only is she able to produce big laughs by delivering the self-aware horror comedy camp with a level of flare and energy that suits a movie about a bear that starts killing people once it starts eating the dozens of kilos of coke that a notorious drug smuggler (Matthew Rhys) dropped in the Georgia forest where they reside, she finds ways to throw in some surprises without ever straying too far from the film's core B-movie mission statement.
The varying sets of motivations each character has for being in the forest the day (ex: Keri Russell is a single mother looking for her daughter and her daughter's friend who skipped school that day to go paint a cave wall, Ray Liotta plays a drug kingpin who tasks his errand boys O'Shea Jackson Jr. and Alden Ehrenreich-who happens to be his son-with securing the coke, Margo Martindale is a hot-headed park ranger who is fed up with people coming into the forest and not respecting serenity of nature) directly dictates how they behave once they encounter the bear, a vast majority of the kills materialize in such gruesome, unexpected ways that each death is accompanied with a visceral shock to system and there's an absurdist streak to the humor that pairs beautifully with the playfulness that naturally inhabits campy material and helps a lot of the punchlines land with a greater impact. It's hard to imagine any director who could've struck a better balance of comedy, horror/gore and characterization with this material and based on the level of enthusiasm that was in my theater along with what I've heard anecdotally online, Banks' approach satisfied a lot of people who went to see Cocaine Bear this past weekend.
After sitting on it for a few days, I can say with complete confidence that Cocaine Bear is the 1st movie of 2023 that I truly loved. Watching a movie execute its gameplan with such passion and precision from everybody involved (on top of Banks' direction, the script from Jimmy Warden and performances from Ehrenreich, Martindale and Isiah Whitlock Jr. as a dog-loving cop in pursuit of Liotta's character manage to stand out) is such a joy, especially when those winning efforts are enhanced when the film is consumed by an engaged crowd in a public space. Keep these genre dice rolls coming Universal. There's a whole contingent of gleeful weirdos that are counting on you.
Grade: B+
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