2023 ‧ Comedy/Action/Adventure/Horror/WTF ‧ 95m
The third film by Elizabeth Banks offers the audience exactly what the title claims, a Cocaine Bear.
A horror-tinged adventure film with a high concept inspired by the death of Andrew C. Thornton in 1985. Thornton was found with 35 kilos of cocaine on his person having died after jumping out of an airplane. Investigators determined that numerous bags of cocaine were thrown out and accidently strewn about the Georgia wilderness, as part of an elaborate distribution plan. This was confirmed a couple months later when a dead black bear with several grams of the narcotic in its system was found. You can see this bear, stuffed and nicknamed Pablo Escobear, in Lexington, KY.
This article may already be taking things too seriously. Andrew Thornton and the bear are the only true elements of the film’s story. Banks and writer Jimmy Warden give us a few parallel storylines around the idea of a coked-out bear wreaking havoc. Two drug dealers, O'Shea Jackson Jr. and Alden Ehrenreich, head into the woods in search of the product on orders from their boss, played by the late Ray Liotta. Isiah Whitlock Jr plays a detective pursuing Liotta, who determines that he must be involved with Thornton. Keri Russell plays a mother searching for her daughter with her daughter’s friend. There are other characters who mostly serve the slasher-esque role of being bear bait.
A gory film about a bear attacking and killing people in the woods sounds like a horror story, and one could pretend the bear is replacing Jason in a Friday the 13th entry, but it’s a comedy. A bonkers black comedy, no less. Not exactly In Bruges type humor, but something akin to Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz. Jackson and Ehrenreich have good buddy chemistry, as does Russell and Christian Convery. Liotta gives off a comic intensity that is already missed.
Cocaine Bear is the kind of movie that knows what it is and generally succeeds in what it wants to do. It may have one plotline too many, which drags the last act a little, but it is funny and features some solid horror/action sequences. Is it a “good” movie? That depends on what you look for in a movie. For the most part it achieves its goals, which is saying something. It is entertaining and fun with a crowd. Hard to say if it could become a “cult classic,” but it would play well at midnight. Fans of Lake Placid and Piranha will find a lot to like here. It’s the kind of flick you are either going to be into the concept or not. I was.
Grade: C+/B-
~Andrew