Producers: Drew Simon, Tory Tunnell, Joby Harold, Sam Speiser, Matt Schwartz and Julian Rosenberg Directors: Dan Berk and Robert Olsen Screenplay: Lars Jacobson Cast: Jack Quaid, Amber Midthunder, Ray Nicholson, Betty Gabriel, Matt Walsh, Lou Beatty Jr., Evan Hengst, Conrad Kemp, Jacob Batalon, Garth Collins, Tristan de Beer and Craig Jackson Distributor: Paramount Pictures
Grade: C-
It’s hard to believe that anybody thought it was a good idea to base a gory action comedy on a premise trivializing a life-threatening medical condition, but screenwriter Lars Jacobson (whose sole previous feature credit was 2017’s “Day of the Dead: Bloodline”) did, and some studio executives apparently agreed. Directors Dan Berk and Robert Olsen (“Villains,” “Significant Other”) jumped on board, and the result is “Novocaine,” which, like the drug, will evoke different responses: it will make lovers of comic movie violence blissful while inducing those averse to it to gag.
Jack Quaid, probably best known for his role in Prime Video’s “The Boys” and the recent horror comedy “Companion,” is Nathan Caine, a straight-laced, timid fellow who’s the assistant manager at a San Diego credit union but a nice one—with the imminent arrival of Christmas, he postpones calling in the loan of recent widower Earl (Lou Beatty Jr.) so that the old fellow can keep his store open through the holiday. Nathan is also infatuated with recently-hired clerk Sherry (Amber Midthunder), but too shy to say so.
He also suffers from CIP, congenital insensitivity to pain or congenital analgesia, which compels him to live a very cautious life: the slightest injury could be fatal, since he wouldn’t feel it. As he tells Sherry when she invites him out for coffee after spilling a scalding cup of it on his hand, he doesn’t even eat solid food for fear of biting off his tongue. Nonetheless he succumbs to her prodding, tastes her cherry pie (!), and loves it. Later at a bar she defends him against an arrogant high school classmate of his (Tristan de Beer), one of the bullies who nicknamed him Novocaine because of his condition.
At the office the next day, three robbers dressed in Santa suits arrive brandishing automatic weapons and demand the safe be opened. Their leader, a snarling guy named Simon (Ray Nicholson), kills the manager (Craig Jackson), forces Nathan to open the safe and, once the cops arrive, takes Sherry hostage. Simon and another of the trio, Andre (Conrad Kemp), take off with her in tow after shooting down the cops. The third, whom we later learn is Andre’s bother Ben (Evan Hengst), escapes separately. Nathan, fearing the backup won’t arrive in time to pursue them, grabs a police car and does so himself. He eventually winds up facing off against Ben, and after that tracks down Simon, Andre and, of course, Sherry. Meanwhile SDPD officers Mincy (Betty Gabriel) and Coltraine (Matt Walsh) are on his trail, suspecting he was part of the gang.
Nathan’s trek takes him from one brutal encounter to another, including one with Zeno (Garth Collins), a fearsome tattoo artist, and another with Ben in his elaborately booby-trapped house. He’s forced to call on his only friend Roscoe (Jacob Batalon), the online pal he plays video games with, for help, but whatever injuries he suffers in the process of being beaten, stabbed and otherwise brutalized, a shot of epinephrine keeps him going like a human version of the Energizer Bunny. And when he finds Simon and Sherry, he has a surprise in store.
But the movie doesn’t stop there. It careens on for another excruciating act, with yet another villain who has as many lives as the proverbial cat. When Alan Arkin came back in “Wait Until Dark,” it was genuinely frightening. When Stevenson, trying desperately to channel his father’s gift for maniacal depravity, does so repeatedly, it’s just boring.
As for the others, Midthunder has an appealing sauciness, while Batalon, as a guy much less heroic in real life than he is online, gets predictable chuckles doing his shtick. So does Walsh. As for Quaid, he strikes one as a more likely second banana than a leading man, looking rather like an elongated Stan Laurel; but he’s certainly game about going through all the indignities the script demands. The movie looks pretty threadbare, as befitting the San Diego setting, with a pedestrian production design (Kara Lindstrom) and cinematography (Jacques Jouffret); equally nondescript is the generic score by Lorne Balfe and Andrew Kawcynski. The fight choreography is reasonably good and the editing (Christian Wagner) tries to be energetic but sometimes sputters; more impressive are the gore effects, though whether showing fingernails being convincingly ripped off is an accomplishment to savor is questionable.
So is the very idea is depicting CIP in the way “Novocaine” does, as a comic means of becoming a quasi-superman. The premise is actually pretty tasteless, and though fans of such cartoonish violence might be willing to overlook that to get their fill of live-action Looney Tunes mayhem, others with more sensitive stomachs will feel differently.