As a former professional wrestler, Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson was an obvious choice for action movies when he made the transition to Hollywood. There’s something that those wrestling fans already know that many movie fans may not be aware of however. The Rock is damn funny. The new movie Central Intelligence looks to combine these two skills into a single movie, and if that’s not enough, he’s got one of the most popular comedians on the planet to back him up in the comedy department, Kevin Hart. Check out the film’s first trailer.
We probably should have warned you about that scene at the end, it’s more than a little creepy, sorry. In Central Intelligence Johnson plays a former high school nerd who reconnects with former hot shot Hart. In town for their high school reunion, "Bob" says he’s now part of the C.I.A. He apparently needs Hart’s character’s accounting skills to break a case. It’s at this point that we assume the shenanigans begin to ensue. Hart is along for the ride whether he likes it or not while Johnson appears to be enjoying himself risking life and limb.
While the movie looks to be your standard "buddy cop" flick, even if one of them isn’t actually a cop, it’s the strength of the leads that will either make or break it. From this brief glimpse, the chemistry between Kevin Hart and The Rock looks to be solid. The Rock’s confidence on screen is nearly always solid, and by exaggerating that for comedic effect, the character looks to be borderline crazy. Hart has played a very similar character before in Ride Along and will again in that movie’s sequel. In fact, that may be the biggest problem that Central Intelligence may have. Ride Along 2 is due out in January, meaning we will have seen Hart play a very similar character twice, and once in the same year before this movie comes out.
It’s good to see The Rock doing something funny again. While his resume hasn’t been entirely devoid of comedy, nobody would argue that The Gameplan or The Tooth Fairy were comedic masterpieces. His best comedic role to date was probably his bit in Get Smart, which might have been a better film if he’d been in more of it. Making fans laugh was a big part of what made him one of the most popular professional wrestlers in history, and hopefully this will be the movie that will make film fans laugh as well.
Here’s hoping that Central Intelligence turns out as funny as it looks. Are you adding this one to your summer movie list yet?
