The Problem of High-Concept Plots in “Cocaine Bear”
Elizabeth Banks’ film, like “Snakes on a Plane” and “We Bought a Zoo,” delivers exactly what the title promises. What happens next?
Darkness descends. A middle-aged American male, naked to the waist, fights a furious bear in the woods, under the pelting of a pitiless storm. This elemental sequence is from the 1977 film “Day of the Animals,” and the joy of it is that the battling man is played by Leslie Nielsen, and the film is not—repeat, not—intended as a comedy. What could possibly top that?
“Cocaine Bear,” a new film written and directed by Elizabeth Banks, is one answer. It’s said to be based on true events, much like “Pinocchio” is based on string theory. In 1985, duffelbags of cocaine were thrown out of a plane over the Chattahoochee National Forest. Syd (Ray Liotta), a drug dealer, owns the bags and wants them safely gathered in. To that end, his son, Eddie (Alden Ehrenreich), and a henchman, Daveed (O’Shea Jackson, Jr.), are sent to Georgia’s great green wilds. A nurse named Sari is also present, and she is completely innocent of any crime (Keri Russell).Her thirteen-year-old daughter, Deirdre, or Dee Dee (Brooklynn Prince), who has skipped school and gone hiking with her friend Henry, is also desperately looking for what has gone missing (Christian Convery). A cop from out of state, Bob (Isiah Whitlock, Jr.), and a local ranger, Liz, represent law enforcement (Margo Martindale). A butterfly, a deer, and a black bear represent the animal kingdom. Only one of these is high on cocaine, but with butterflies, you never know.
“Cocaine Bear,” like “So I Married an Axe Murderer” (1993) and “We Bought a Zoo” (2011), is explained by its title. I must have missed an allegory or a political parable in which Banks points the finger at our environmental transgressions. According to what I saw, she simply made a film about a bear who does coke: eats it, snorts it, hunts it, sneezes it, and showers in it at one point. (Is this a wink to “Little April Shower,” the sweetest scene in “Bambi?” It’s as if Quentin Tarantino began his career in the early 1990s with a story about some dogs who visit a real reservoir.
The problem with high-concept films is not so much the concept as it is the height. We laugh when we first hear about them, and we enjoy the buzz generated by the trailers; given that level of anticipation, it’s no surprise that the films themselves suffer. As was the case with “Snakes on a Plane” (2006), I feel obligated to report that “Cocaine Bear” follows suit. Why does the entire cast, including the children, swear so freely and loudly (“We’re fucked,” Henry exclaims), if not to advertise the incredibleness of the main plot? The violence is also far nastier than necessary, with cameos from severed limbs and an actress being dragged along a road, her face bumping and scraping in closeup. The excess, however gleeful, is that of a film anxiously paying homage to itself. Look, it seems to say, here’s an apex predator turning homicidal! What did you anticipate?
The volume is occasionally reduced. The most convincing interaction is not between man and beast, but between mother and daughter—Sari and Dee Dee at home early on. Brooklynn Prince was fantastic as an impish six-year-old in “The Florida Project” (2017), so why is she allowed to disappear for so long as Dee Dee? Banks, who is always a sympathetic presence onscreen, doesn’t appear here, in her own film, but I can’t help but wish she did; the calm decency she exuded in “Love & Mercy” (2014) might have helped to calm this film’s nerves. Instead, “Cocaine Bear” has a strange jostling quality to it, with the various characters shuffle onto centre stage only to be elbowed aside to make way for the next contender.
We’re left with an awkward question: who are we supposed to root for? I suppose it’s for the bear, except that C.G.I., despite its wondrous re-creation of flesh and fur, is less adept at pixelating a personality, and there’s little here to match the appeal of Baloo in “The Jungle Book” (1967), who ate nothing more potent than prickly pear and pawpaw. To be honest, cocaine feels like a bare necessity. Still, there will be audiences who cackle like witches at this stuff, especially at midnight showings (assuming those jamborees exist in the age of streaming), and Banks may be enticed back for sequels, with different stars and different mashups of addictive substances and untamed mammals. Prepare for “Fentanyl Hyena,” “Meth Bobcat,” and the unapologetic “Skunk Skunk.” Regrettably, the possibilities are limitless.
What an odd binge it would be if you sat down and watched all five films competing for Best International Feature Film at this year’s Academy Awards. Start with “Argentina, 1985,” which, despite relying on the tired tradition of the courtroom finale, has a refreshing lack of stridency. Following that would be “Close” and “EO,” the first a sad saga of two Belgian boys, and the second a form of pilgrimage. (The pilgrim in question is a donkey, and what he goes through is difficult to bear, but following in his hoofsteps is a transcendent privilege, in my opinion.) With a deep breath and a large whisky, you could brave “All Quiet on the Western Front,” which, while only intermittently gripping, leaves you entrenched in the harshest sense. Finally, with Oscar night approaching, you could recover with “The Quiet Girl,” the final contender to be released.
