As Dwayne Johnson continually grasps onto more and more projects, there’s a lesson he should take away from Baywatch, and that’s that he cannot do all the heavy lifting himself. He can effortlessly lead a movie and promote it, but the behind the scenes is a mess. As nice a time the cast is having, they’re all giving bad material to work with and the film falls flat on its face because of it.
What went wrong? Multiple things. The biggest being a mess of a script; the movie is lost in jokes and story. Lifeguards are trying to solve a crime that ultimately should be in the hands of the police, and there’s even a joke about that? It functions like a stretched up TV episode which doesn’t help it. The pitch definitely branched off of the booming success of 21 Jump Street, but fails to capture the magic of why those movies worked. 21 Jump Street and its sequel satirized the showed as a point of self-awareness and made efforts to be something else. Baywatch could be classified as satirical, but it sure doesn’t feel that way.
Out of everything the movie tries, which is surprisingly more than one thing, its attempts at humour rarely work. Somewhat clever sex joke? Throw it on in. Dicks! Refer to the the leads (Johnson and Efron’s) masculine images and bravado as something to own up to! Oh, and slow-mo. There’s your check list. Story arc? Zac Efron is willing to work with a team. Trust me, I doubt that could ever be compelling.
With a budget around 70 million, you’d think something could be done with the special effects which are abysmal and extremely distracting to the whole movie. There’s no reason I should have to bring up CGI in a comedy – I guess we’ve hit a low. Baywatch a disheveled puzzle of a comedy. Almost funny, but more forgettable. It’s 116 minutes long, and you can feel every minute of it. Is it one of the worst movies ever? No. Is it one of the worst of the year? Sure is. Beware the beach!
Rating 3/10