The Marine

Professional wrestling has never ceased to entertain those of us who love muscle, egotism, and mindless violence. Every few years a new star emerges from some gym somewhere with a personality and ego as big as their biceps. Each new hero of the ring always appear to be a pure product of the teen or tween culture that plays off of sex, ignorance, and machismo, all things which so many men like myself struggle with from time to time. This movies' star epitomizes these qualities unlike any other before.

“The Marine” bursts onto the screen in a scene of heroic rescue of captured soldiers in a barrage of gunfire and hand to fist combat. John Triton, played by WWE champion John Cena, is famous for being a rebel in the ring, and he carries it into film when he denies direct orders to wait for backup. This move soon leads to him being discharged and Mr. Triton replying to the news with “But sir, I’m a Marine.” He then takes a job as a security guard where he’s restless for action until a weasly enraged man comes to harass an ex-girlfriend and eventually is tossed out of the front window by our hero. This leads to his termination, and discouragement about desired job options for an ex-Marine. He returns home to his loving wife and they decide to take a trip to get their minds off things. That’s when the trouble starts.

While getting gas, a band of Larry, Curly and Moe diamond thieves are threatened by a squad car that pulls up for gas behind them. The violence starts up and the wife is taken hostage and Mr. Triton is left for dead. The “Marine” then chases them down in the vacant squad car to her rescue. A pursuit through the supposedly alligator infested swamps of South Carolina ensues.

Personally, I wanted to walk out half way through the movie when our hero gets sidelined by some drug smugglers in a barn in the middle of the forest. The script and the acting are equally terrible. The usually solid Robert Patrick, who plays the character Rome, fairs the worst. He answers a cell phone call about his satellite deal while dodging police. John Cena actually faired better with the acting than the others, but that doesn’t say much with this movie.

There’s not much self sacrifice when you have John Cena chasing these criminals. John’s persistence in saving his wife is admirable, and his violent way of going about it is understandable with him being a “Marine” and all. The only thing is, marines are very intelligent, and this movie is not. It could have displayed all of the cunning tactics and methods that marines use, but there was none of that. Not only that, but no character development, no depth of story, nothing. The profanity is moderate, with one f-bomb, and many other unnecessary expletives. There’s plenty of gay jokes, sex jokes, and much more crude language.

The violence is senseless and cartoonish, with no clever fight choreographing.

Overall, this movie is just plain B-movie bad. Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson’s first role in “The Scorpion King” was impressive, and his films since then have all been respectably successful. I don’t know if John Cena’s future holds such hope, because this movie was just plain laughable. Hardcore wrestling fans will most likely enjoy this, but any serious movie fan will probably realize what I realized no more than ten minutes into the movie. So with this movie, my advice is when King David commissioned himself in the Psalms to “set nothing that is base before his eyes.”

Violence: Heavy / Profanity: Moderate / Sex/Nudity: Mild