Back in 2002, The Smashing Machine: The Life and Times of Extreme Fighter Mark Kerr delivered exactly what its title promised. Capturing Kerr at a pivotal moment in his MMA career and personal life, the documentary was rife with the kind of drama that felt made for the movies. Now, Benny Safdie, has adapted the film/real-life Kerr’s life—including a much shorter title—and directed a film version structured for maximum impact.
Former wrestler Dwayne Johnson stars as Kerr, also a former wrestler, who transitioned into MMA in the late ’90s during the early years of the sport. We first meet Mark in the ring, during an early career match in Brazil. With his imposing physique and ruthless fighting style, Kerr leaves his opponent bloody and struggling for consciousness. It’s a shocking display of physical prowess that Safdie only enhances through his filmmaking. The subwoofer is always working overtime during the fights, making the audience feel every knee to the head and every mind-numbing punch. Likewise, composer Nala Sinephro’s score is at its most unpredictable during these scenes, jazzy and percussive to emphasize the wildness of these brawls.
However, given the opening fight’s ferocity, it’s surprising, then, to realize what a soft-spoken, charismatic guy Kerr is outside of the ring. Johnson channels his brightest movie star charm, playing off Kerr’s annoyance that the MMA doctors in Japan won’t give him anything stronger than Advil for his pain or chatting up an older woman in a doctor’s office even when his face resembles pulverized meat. Kerr’s real-life speaking voice is a tad higher than Johnson’s, but the actor clearly studied him because his diction and tone mimic Kerr perfectly. The result is that we are immediately endeared to Kerr and his inherent kindness makes his personal struggles all the more upsetting to witness.
Those struggles come in two major forms. The first is his opioid addiction, which developed thanks to the constant pain his profession causes him. Through Johnson, we watch Kerr weaponize his disarming likability, coaxing doctors into filling suspicious prescriptions and failing to convince his friends and family he’s perfectly fine. That storyline comes to a head thanks to the other major personal conflict: his tumultuous relationship with longtime girlfriend, Dawn Staples (Emily Blunt).
Whether or not Johnson and Blunt have credible romantic screen chemistry is a subject of debate, and while this film doesn’t exactly make the answer any clearer for skeptics, their dynamic as Mark and Dawn is, simply put, toxic. Though Kerr is never as sharp or dismissive of Dawn in John Hyams’s documentary as we see here, what Safdie conveys is that these are two people whose love has curdled. When Dawn first shows up for a pivotal fight Japan, just before Kerr’s first loss, we can see the chaos she represents in his life from the way his coach and fellow fighter Mark Coleman (real-life MMA fighter, Ryan Bader) reacts. He knows she’s trouble and she immediately proves it by picking a fight with Kerr that the film suggests puts him in the bad headspace that leads him to lose.
From there, their scenes oscillate from playful to fraught, frequently growing contentious at the slightest provocation. Sometimes these disagreements are small, seemingly incidental. Take the scene where Mark, freshly back from rehab, nags Dawn about the chores she’s neglected in his absence. First, there are the leaves in the pool, which she puts her book down momentarily to argue have just fallen in. Then there’s the saguaro cactus she didn’t prune correctly, potentially spoiling the chance for it to look like it does “in the cartoons” like he wants. Johnson and Blunt play these scenes brilliantly, weaponizing their easy banter. The result is a tense mix of fury, disappointment and even exhaustion that leaves the audience feeling like they and the couple are hurtling toward some type of disaster.
Indeed, perhaps the film’s most harrowing moments take place inside their home rather than in the ring. And certainly, one could read the way the film treats Dawn as cruel, perhaps even villainizing. The real-life Dawn is not as involved with promoting the film as the real-life Mark and one wonders how she feels about the portrayal. Regardless for her part, Blunt plays Dawn with untold layers. Every moment she’s on screen feels filled with danger and unpredictability. Meanwhile, Johnson plays Kerr with incredible feeling. He is—thanks to his physique—terrifying, but—thanks to his gentle demeanor—vulnerable. Like the real-life Kerr, Johnson plays the character with a surprising softness. His Mark is a sweet, thoughtful guy who just happens to make a living savagely beating the shit out of other guys. In the context of his career, this performance is nothing short of singular. Awards season is just starting, but it would be a surprise if he weren’t still in the conversation in a few months.
Still, as strong as The Smashing Machine is as a showcase for what an outstanding actor Johnson can be with the right material, it’s still worth questioning whether it achieves a greater truth or emotional resonance than the documentary that inspired it. Because Safdie takes so much of that film’s structure and drama to make his own, it can feel almost like a dramatization. Some of the film’s most potent emotional beats are lifted directly from Hyams’s film, like the brilliant, climactic cross-cutting between Kerr and Coleman. Others, like the aforementioned scene with Blunt and Johnson near the end feel like they fill in moments the documentary didn’t capture but are so melodramatic that we’re left wondering whether these moments are real or wholly imagined for dramatic effect.
However, putting those larger questions aside, The Smashing Machine is undeniably well-made. The fight scenes are visceral and Johnson turns in what will become one of the definitive performances of his career. It’s hard to ask for more from Safdie’s film when so much of it works so well.
