'Cocaine Bear' review: We hope you're ready for the 'Citizen Kane' of coked-out animal movies
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Does a bear snorting a line of coke off a severed leg sound like a good time? If so, then let's get the 2024 Oscar best picture convo started for “Cocaine Bear.”
Directed by Elizabeth Banks and inspired by a bizarre real-life story, the dark comedy/survival thriller (★★★ out of four; rated R; in theaters Friday) is a proudly ridiculous yet sincerely enjoyable exercise of putting wacky characters in the war path of a dangerous (and very high) beast. The “Citizen Kane” of coked-out bear movies is not perfect by any stretch but like its furry star, the film is scrappy and hungry while owning its throwback absurdity.
Who is Cocaine Bear?:Meet Kentucky's wildest, drug-fueled legend
‘Cocaine Bear’ puts bonkers spin on a stranger-than-fiction story
The movie is ripped from a real 1985 headline: A drug smuggler (played by Matthew Rhys) is found dead on a Tennessee driveway after having bailed out of his plane and gotten rid of hundreds of pounds of Colombian white snow. Duffel bags of the stuff rained down on a Georgia national park, and thus Cocaine Bear was born.
The real animal overdosed and died – not so much in the movie version. After discovering a drug habit, the bear attacks a pair of Icelandic hikers (Kristofer Hivju and Hannah Hoekstra) then encounters a pair of 12-year-olds (Brooklynn Prince and Christian Convery), a single-mom nurse (Keri Russell), an out-of-state cop (Isiah Whitlock Jr.), an ambulance crew and a gang of pretentious forest-dwelling punks named after French artist Marcel Duchamp.
Ray Liotta leads the human 'Cocaine' contingent
“Cocaine Bear” is a movie with many instances of dismemberment, bullet wounds, clawed buttocks and gory death – and almost as many subplots. There are scads of supporting characters who tend to bog down the momentum, including a side narrative about drug dealers seeking the missing coke. The late Ray Liotta plays a St. Louis crime lord while Alden Ehrenreich is his sad-sack son and O’Shea Jackson Jr. is the trusted fixer (and the younger guy’s BFF), all of whom bring a welcome second wind to the movie once the crooks finally run afoul of the Cocaine Bear.
Margo Martindale is a hoot as the embattled park ranger forced to deal with this madness, but it’s Liotta who gives the movie madcap heft. His character Syd first watches his grandkid in a Chuck E. Cheese-type fun zone before later hunting our ursine heroine with a shotgun. As one of his last roles, it fits well in the deep roster of tough guys and signature personalities Liotta brought to cinematic life.
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The movie fully embraces its Reagan-era setting
Any ’80s kids who still have those Nancy Reagan “Just Say No” PSAs living rent-free in their brains will find something to love in “Cocaine Bear.” There’s a great needle drop of “On the Wings of Love,” and fans of “The Goonies,” “The Monster Squad” and their period ilk will appreciate a precocious moment when the youngsters decide on a whim to taste some coke (and promptly spit it out).
Jimmy Warden’s screenplay delivers some hilarious moments and Banks has a penchant for balancing action and comedy – if you didn’t dig her “Charlie’s Angels,” you probably don’t like fun things – though there is a third-act reveal that brings in a welcome helping of emotional stakes.
But come on: It’s really all about the bear
The biggest downside is that there’s never enough Cocaine Bear in “Cocaine Bear.” The computer-generated animal has a ton of personality and she looks real enough to be fearsome but not overly so, which helps in some of the comedic scenes. She’s delightful to watch in her altered state, like being distracted by a butterfly before unleashing mayhem.
But the bear is more underdog than serial killer in general – honestly, there’s a lot of gnarly horror that’s not really her fault. There’s a subtle nod to her being a victim in the period’s war on drugs, but you don’t have to grin and bear it as a political screed. “Cocaine Bear” only asks that you love the B-movie beauty and its fabulous beast.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: 'Cocaine Bear' review: Just say yes to the fun, coked-out carnage
