Not since last year’s “Hit Man” (which I reviewed here) have we had an action comedy that worked as well as “Novocaine.”
Jack Quaid (son of Meg Ryan and Dennis Quaid) stars as Nathan Caine, nicknamed Novocaine because he has a rare gender defect which makes it impossible for him to feel pain. That might sound less like a curse than a benefit, until we learn that he has to set the timer on his watch to go off every three hours or his bladder might explode because he can’t feel when it’s full. He also can’t eat solid food for fear he’ll chew off his own tongue.
Nathan is the assistant manager at a bank where three brutal holdup guys show up in Santa suits and things go really badly. Not only do they kill the manager for not giving up the combination to open the vault, but when they leave, they take a teller named Sherry with them. It just so happens that Nathan has a crush on Sherry and has just started a relationship with her. He may not be able to be hurt physically, but he’s still heartbroken over what might happen to Sherry, so he takes it upon himself to follow the thieves and get her back.
Along the way, the “Novocaine” stunt team does a lot of work. Unlike the spy movie I wrote about yesterday (“Black Bag,” read my review here), this one contains plenty of chase sequences, car crashes, shootouts, and fights with any number of weapons. But it’s all cartoonish in a good way, like an Itchy and Scratchy cartoon on “The Simpsons.”
At one point, one of the bad guys tells another that his brother is taking too long getting to their meet up location, so he’s going to his house to see if he’s there. The other bad guy replies, “You remember he has that whole place booby-trapped, right?” Of course that turns out to be foreshadowing for Nathan’s arrival at the house first, where he trips the booby traps, none of which hurt him but do show him down a bit.
Quaid must be used to such scenes since he’s one of the stars of Prime Video’s “The Boys,” in which he’s a human with no special powers trying to take down an evil global cabal of superheroes who can shoot laser beams out of their eyes and make anyone’s head explode in a gory, bloody mess. As on that show, Quaid comes across in “Novocaine” as a likable everyman with the odds stacked against him.
He’s supported nicely by Amber Midthunder as Sherry, Ray Nicholson (yes, Jack’s son) chewing the scenery as the lead bad guy, Jacob Batalan as Nathan’s gamer pal, plus Betty Gabriel and Matt Walsh as detectives on the case. Lars Jacobsen’s script and direction by Dan Berk and Robert Olsen balance the comedy and action well, with special credits to the makeup crew who did some amazing work on Caine’s hands and body as he incurs injuries along the way. He may not be able to feel pain, but several audience members moaned just seeing some of the damage done to his body.
As with many action comedies, you could easily poke holes in the plot of “Novocaine” (there are several instances of one of my wife’s favorite movie cliches, the character who is dead/not dead). But I preferred to just take it in as a fun popcorn movie, so I’m giving it an 8 out of 10.