The Rock

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I tend to find for the most part that director Michael Bay is very hit or miss with audiences and critics alike. He embodies a hell of a lot of, what we could call, "dude porn" stereotypes. This is car chases, explosions, gunfire, women in skimpy clothing, the list goes on. For my money, this one represents Michael Bay at his best, embodying all of these stereotypes, but giving us a pretty interesting story all the same. In other words, it's not just noise.

A disillusioned war General, Francis Hummel (Ed Harris), and a few of his followers, plan to unleash a deadly chemical on the city of San Francisco. They set up shop when they take over the famous Alcatraz prison - famous for being inescapable. Their demands are for $100 Million in reparations to the families of his fallen army companions, or they otherwise launch nerve gas over the city.

Meanwhile, FBI chemist, Stanley Goodspeed (Nicholas Cage) is called in to team up with John Patrick Mason (Sean Connery), a former Alcatraz inmate, known as the only person to successfully escape the inescapable prison, and has since had his identity swept under the rug. They must break into the prison with their combined expertise, and put a stop to Hummel's plans, and hopefully escape with their lives.

The film has all the proper Bay-isms that you'll be looking for, so any action buffs out there won't be too disappointed. But it adds some flavor to his usual, with the lovingly crazy Nicholas Cage (who's actually kinda toned down here from his usual), and the just plain awesome and we all know it, Sean Connery - the original James Bond, himself. Truth be told, growing up, this was probably only the second thing I had seen Connery in, first knowing him as the little old man who was Indiana Jones' father. So I was pleasantly surprised at his badassery here.

This is a good example of why I kind of enjoy Michael Bay. I get the same fun, popcorn action movie feeling I do from this than I do with the 'Bad Boys' movies, or to a lesser extent *cough* 'Armageddon' (go ahead and put that one with my guilty pleasures). There's still a few I haven't seen yet, but I feel that for the most part, Bay fails when he's trying to adapt something. If he can do something no one is familiar with, and make it his own, you can have a fun time with it. In my eyes, he's the last of a generation, and the torch has kinda been passed to... I dunno, Chad Stahelski ('John Wick')?

This is another one that's just a lot of fun to put on if you want a taste of intense action, but with a villain you might be able to relate to. It's always interesting to come to an understanding as to why the bad guy is doing what he's doing. It's always very refreshing when films veer away from the scenarios of "because I can", and "I must rule this place" (not that I don't enjoy 'Batman' villains). Ed Harris does a great job here, and between the three lead actors, he's almost the most human aspect of the whole story.

So, if you're in search of some good action from the 90's, with a few Cage-isms here, or a few Connery accents there, this one's for you. When you think Michael Bay, you think of a lot of things, but somehow this one manages to fit all of his cliches in a nice little package, and I find it quite possibly his best work next to the 'Bad Boys' movies. Give it a whirl, you might just have a fun ride.

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