THE STORY – When the girl of his dreams gets kidnapped, a man turns his inability to feel pain into an unexpected advantage as he fights a bunch of thugs to get her back.
THE CAST – Jack Quaid, Amber Midthunder, Ray Nicholson, Jacob Batalon, Betty Gabriel & Matt Walsh
THE TEAM – Dan Berk, Robert Olsen (Directors) & Lars Jacobson (Writer)
THE RUNNING TIME – 110 Minutes
Sometimes, all you need to make a good movie is a clever premise and the perfect star in the lead role. Such is the case with “Novocaine,” a standard-issue big-studio action comedy that may not have the tightest script but makes up for it with a bonkers premise: Nathan Caine (Jack Quaid, on a hot streak right now between this and “Companion”), Assistant Manager at the San Diego Trust Credit Union, has a genetic disorder that has rendered him incapable of feeling pain. To manage this, he has put protectors on all sharp corners, always drinks his hot coffee on ice, and doesn’t even eat solid food (just in case he accidentally bites his tongue off). The day after his first date with his workplace crush, bank teller Sherry (Amber Midthunder), their credit union is robbed by a trio of men in Santa suits wielding machine guns. After killing the bank manager and beating Nathan senselessly in front of Sherry, the robbers take her as a hostage, forcing Nathan to embrace his disability and chase them down these ex-military badasses in order to save her. Everything goes exactly as you would expect, with some fun twists and turns as things go on, but what really elevates “Novocaine,” aside from the clever ways it exploits Nathan’s inability to feel pain, is Quaid’s ridiculously charming performance in the lead role.
To effectively lead an action comedy about a hapless everyman in over his head, one needs to have both incredible charisma to keep the audience engaged and an endearing sense of humor to maintain the illusion of being an average Joe. Quaid has all that and then some. The “day in the life” montage that opens the movie, cheekily set to R.E.M.’s “Everybody Hurts,” sets Nathan up as a bit of a sad sack, and Quaid puts his lanky, long-limbed body to perfect use, slumping his shoulders and going through the motions with no energy whatsoever. His whole demeanor changes when Sherry enters the room, though. With only the slightest adjustments to his face and posture, Quaid brightens from within, going from pathetically average to adorably lovestruck in a second. He continues to use that elastic face and gangly body to perfect use throughout “Novocaine,” as Nathan puts his body through the wringer on his quest to save Sherry. He proves just as adept at action as he is at comedy, throwing himself around with the complete abandonment of someone who doesn’t know how to fight but knows they just need to land one good hit. Sherry’s crack about Nathan’s condition making him a superhero isn’t entirely true (very ugly things happen to Nathan’s body that he doesn’t easily recover from). Still, Quaid treats the movie like a superhero origin story anyway, and he has the star power to pull it off. The more Nathan fully embraces his condition, the more you see Quaid become a movie star. As Nathan’s confidence grows, so does Quaid’s charisma, from the endearing charm of a lovesick puppy to full-on movie star swagger. In Quaid’s hands, Nathan Caine becomes a genuine good-guy hero, one almost completely devoid of the toxic masculinity that usually defines male leads in this kind of movie.
In another refreshing change of pace, the “wild” action set pieces in “Novocaine” actually deliver on that descriptor. Cinematographer Jacques Jouffret overuses the technique of moving the camera with the actors so that everything seems to move around them, which is an effective way of putting the audience right in the center of the action but also becomes less exciting and effective with each iteration. But, the ways in which Nathan puts his body at risk get increasingly clever (and increasingly gross) throughout, constantly upping the ante and giving each action sequence a sick kick of cleverness. Most of the time, the setup for these visual gags is quite obvious, but that only adds to the fun. Considering that Nathan’s day starts with getting shot and only gets worse from there, you may need as much intolerance to gore as Nathan has to pain to get through it all without covering your eyes, but at least co-directors Dan Berk and Robert Olsen keep the tone as light and tongue-in-cheek as possible. The movie knows it’s ridiculous and treats everything with just enough seriousness so that it works as an action-packed thrill ride, but it’s also very clear that the film is going to ever more ridiculous extremes in order to entertain the audience, and it mostly succeeds.
“Novocaine” stumbles in its third act, badly losing steam during an extended finale featuring Ray Nicholson’s head bank robber that goes on for far too long. The balance between seriousness and ridiculousness that previously served as a boon to the film suddenly fails as Nicholson goes from average psycho to invulnerable supervillain in nothing flat, stretching the movie’s tone past the breaking point. Ending with your worst material isn’t ideal, but it’s also not exactly uncommon in Hollywood, and “Novocaine” does at least bring everything to a close with a good final scene, but the climax is so misjudged that it does feel deflating to watch. Thankfully, the movie has done more than enough by that point to earn the audience’s goodwill, and Quaid remains tremendous all the way through the near-perfect final shot. For the vast majority of its nearly hour running time, “Novocaine” is just the shot of cleverness Hollywood needed in its action comedies. That’s worthy of praise, but Jack Quaid finally coming into his own as a movie star is a true cause for celebration.
