When it comes to “reimagining” (read: remaking) classic films from the 80s, filmmakers wisely stuck close to genres that could translate well to more modern times, i.e. horror. After all, if an iconic character was brutally murderous back in the day, it’s not going to be much of an issue if they’re just as vicious now, but how would you translate the muscle bound, bodycount monsters of the action genre to these, more “enlightened” times. Thornier movies like Cobra, Commando or Rambo: First Blood Part 2 see square-jawed heroes massacre hundreds for political and social reasons that simply aren’t going to translate particularly smoothly with a more sensitive crowd, so what do you do?
Simple, in the words of bouncer/guru James Dalton from the 1989 action movie Road House: you be nice until it’s time to not be nice. And with that slightly baffling advice swimming around your noggin, it’s time to enter Road House 2024, and order a beer…
Elwood Dalton is an ex-UFC fighter who, after an iffy incident in the ring, has fallen upon self-imposed hard times as he travels from place to place and winning bare-knuckle bouts without even having to ball up a fist thanks to his intimidating legend. Enter Frankie, the owner of a roadhouse located in the Florida Keys, who needs a bruiser of such standing to help straighten out her establishment as it’s been beset by thugs numerous times over the last couple of months.
Dalton, something of an amiable chap despite his fearsome reputation, reluctantly agrees and before you know it, he’s marvelling at how odd everyone is while being surrounded by an utter paradise. Of course, this doesn’t last long once the sun goes down and the booze starts flowing and Dalton is barely into his first night when a biker gang shows up and deliberately starts making trouble. However, after some soothing words, a whole mess of bitch-slaps and the occasional broken bone, the Road House’s new bouncer cleans house with impressive results.
However, unbeknownst to Dalton, this wasn’t any normal, roving gang of bikers looking to cause trouble as they have been hired by local big shot Ben Brandt, who is using the money hes obtained by his wealthy father’s imprisonment to try and renovate the area into a luxury holiday destination. The last hold out, of course, is Frankie’s Road House, which is why she hires Dalton in the first place.
Before you know it, matters escalate while all Dalton wants to do is escape his past and get to know local doctor, Ellie, more intimately. But as corrupt police and other such ne’er do Wells pop out of the woodwork, the biggest threat appears to be Knox, a hulking, grinning, mental case who sees taking down Dalton as the challenge he’s waited his entire life for.
What with Jason Statham’s The Beekeeper making its bow a couple of months ago and multiplexes awaiting the arrival of Ryan Gosling’s The Fall Guy, it seems that a new breed of super-slick, super-colourful action brawler has risen up in the gloomy, monosyllabic wake of John Wick 4. Happily wearing its quirky, violent-yet-friendly nature on a tattooed sleeve, Road House saunters into town with all the grizzled confidence of its strangely cheerful lead. Despite being in a self-imposed exile after having beaten a guy to dead in a UFC ring, Elwood Dalton is no mute loner, giving the world steely side-eyes while he single handedly cleans up his adopted town. In fact, taking a cue from Patrick Swayze’s zen-minded original, he’s something of an amiable sort; the sort of guy who can utterly destroy a gang of heavies in hand to hand combat, and then borrow a car to drive them all to the hospital afterwards. It’s somewhat of a natural fit for Jake Gyllenhaal who, with a recent stint as a Spider-Man villain and his appearance in Michael Bay’s Ambulance, is comfortably in the midst of the action phase of his career. Boasting a body chiseled out of pure marble and sporting a calming demeanor, even when he’s snapping fingers like Kit-Kats, Gyllenhaal seems to be having the time of his life as he handles this sun baked conspiracy one thug at a time. He also acquits himself well with the signature brawling too, as Doug Liman’s camera glides in and out of the muscled, inked physiques as they beat seven bells of crap out of each other.
Speaking of Liman, the director of The Bourne Identity, Edge Of Tomorrow and Mr. And Mrs. Smith also seems to be greatly enjoying himself while trying to reimagine a classic that was, itself, famously batshit, but after the first third, the cracks start to show when he seems a little unsure to whether he’s trying to spoof 80s action eccentricities, or if he’s trying to actually be one, but with more modern tropes.
For a lot of the running time, all the weird little details keep the movie magnificently breezey (a cracking running joke involving a thug who is abnormally polite may be one of my favorite of the year so far), while the film doesn’t skimp on the brutality (within the first ten minutes, Dakton is casually shrugging off a knife to the midsection like it’s a minor annoyance), but when the plot starts taking more traditional routes, like random kidnappings in order to up the stakes, things maybe get a little too silly.
Possibly the best indicator of this are the villains who operate on some level of deranged bad guy logic, for example: there’s no real reason for Billy Magnussen’s brattish antagonist to be introduced while being given a shave with a straight razor on a rocking boat and it certainly doesn’t credit him with abnormally high intelligence, but it’s fun in a weird way and it’s memorable. And then there’s the much hyped acting debut of Conor McGregor, who strides into the movie butt naked and proceeds to overact wildly for every single second on screen while that gurning, brilliant grin never leaves his face. As a preening, strutting psycho who throws out excruciating puns as painful as any right cross he’s ever delivered, he’s immediate cinematic Marmite, and how much you’ll take to Road House will probably land on how much you take to his role. Also, this might have been a nice time to reverse some over-used and dated tropes of the genre, but even a director as experimental as Liman can’t think of what to do with Daniela Melchor’s love interest other than having her locked away as leverage.
While trying to gamely out-crazy Road House, Liman and Gyllenhaal have certainly given us a loud, goofy and enjoyable treat, and it’s wonderfully old school to have a modern action movie about blue collar drunks throwing punches while a band plays on, but it still falls noticeably short of fight movie nirvana with some lazy plotting in its final third that draws a bit too closely from the 80s Action Movie Playbook. At the end of the day, Swayze’s house remains superior.
🌟🌟🌟
We Have Issues 