When you think about a Christopher Nolan movie, the performances probably aren’t the first things that come to mind. That said, when the English filmmaker makes a statement about someone’s acting, people are always going to sit up and listen.
Speaking at the DGA theatre in Los Angeles earlier this month, at a preview screening of Bennie Safdie’s The Smashing Machine (a movie that’s received lukewarm reviews and has sputtered at the box office), Nolan made headlines for going to bat for Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson. Here’s what the lauded director said about the wrestler-turned-actor, and why it’s significant.
What Christopher Nolan Said About Dwayne Johnson’s Smashing Machine Performance
Nolan said of Dwayne Johnson in The Smachine Machine: “I think it’s an incredible performance. I don’t think you’ll see a better performance this year or most other years.” Two things are worth noting about these comments. Nolan, who lives in LA, was recently voted president of the DGA (you can check the full chat on the DGA’s podcast), making this rare public appearance perhaps less noteworthy than it might seem. He was also there to support a colleague and friend—Safdie had a substantial role playing Edward Teller in Oppenheimer and even met Johnson’s Smashing Machine co-star, Emily Blunt, on set. And yet the weight of Nolan’s statement seems worthy of attention.
Audiences haven’t worked out what to make of Safdie’s movie yet, a biopic of MMA pioneer Mark Kerr which forgoes most of what we expect from a combat sports flick—especially one about an underdog—in favour of a cosmic approach and a mood of pure introspection. Whatever its eventual legacy, for now it looks like a rare and expensive miss for A24, and an even rarer one for Johnson.
Why Nolan Might Be Right About The Smashing Machine
In that light, Nolan’s praise (he also called the movie “a really remarkable and radical piece of work that will be understood more and more over time”) must have sounded quite comforting to Johnson’s ear. The director has always coveted great actors as much as great actors have coveted the chance to work with him. Nolan can basically get whoever he wants these days, but he’s always had a knack for timing (think Chalamet and McConaughey in Interstellar; Keoghan in Dunkirk) and has shown, on more than one occasion, the strength of his convictions. Two actors have won Oscars after being directed by him: Cillian Murphy last year for Oppenheimer, but most famously, Heath Ledger (awarded posthumously) for The Dark Knight. Some readers might be too young to remember, but Ledger was a wildly unpopular choice for the Joker, and his casting drew no shortage of flak online in 2007—just imagine the kind of heat it would generate on the internet of today.
For a filmmaker of Nolan’s stature and abilities, Johnson’s decision to pivot his career (after the personal and financial disappointments of Black Adam) must surely have pricked up his ears. The director started casting The Odyssey in October last year. Had he begun a little later, is it so wild to think that Safdie would have recommended Johnson for a role? Could Nolan, as he sat there on the DGA theatre stage, have been dreaming up a future project for him? Whatever the case, we’ll have to wait and see where the actor goes from here, and whether an Oscar nomination in January is the end goal to this side quest or the beginning of something new.
If he were to miss out, I think it would be a genuine snub. Writing about the movie back in Venice, I noted that that the most enduring images in The Smashing Machine come not from the ring or the cage, but from the moments when Johnson is out of his comfort zone—adrift on a Tokyo escalator or, even better, as he struggles to digest some apparent feelings of empathy towards the battered chassis and twisted fenders of a demolition derby. These are the kind of moments that elevate the admittedly flawed movie, at least enough to suggest that it will eventually find its people, perhaps when audiences start to consider the movie it is and less the one they expect it to be.
What The Smashing Machine’s Reception Could Mean For Dwayne Johnson’s Future
As Johnson (who starred in Richard Kelly’s Southland Tales) will know as well as anyone, critical reappraisal can come when you least expect it—and in the age of Letterboxd, it tends to happen a lot quicker than it used to. Rutger Hauer’s immortal performance in Blade Runner was famously misunderstood upon release—“mechanical” according to Variety; “the film gives him little dimension,” said The New York Times. Even the great Roger Ebert initially thought Hauer’s performance was “symbolic” before offering a rebuttal on the film’s tenth anniversary. “In Hauer’s Roy Batty,” Ebert wrote, “the film finds its tragic poetry. His final act is not one of evil but of grace, and his death elevates Blade Runner from a noir mystery to a meditation on existence.”
I’m not here to suggest that Safdie’s film will ever be considered in the same breath as Scott’s masterpiece, but I do think some people will still be watching it and thinking about it in ten years. Moreover, whatever flaws it has, Johnson’s performance isn’t one of them—and I for one would be more than happy to see him continue to lend his talents, work rate and star power to movies of this scale and filmmakers this adventurous. At the time of writing, the actor has 12 upcoming projects listed on IMDb. These include new additions to The Fast & the Furious, Jumanji and Jungle Cruise franchises as well as the live-action remake of Moana. Look a little closer, however, and you spot Safdie’s next project, Lizard Music, and an in-development, Hawaii-set crime drama directed by none other than Martin Scorsese. When the dust has settled on The Odyssey, it might be Nolan’s turn to pick up the phone.
