COCAINE BEAR: That Bear Knows How To Party

An 80’s horror/comedy with bright clothes, fun music, a bear that does cocaine, and one final appearance from the late and great Ray Liotta? I’m in instantly. Anything director Elizabeth Banks did after that was just going to be icing on an already delicious cake. I didn’t need a cohesive story or a three-act structure that tied up all the storylines that were started at the beginning… but I got all that anyway. Cocaine Bear isn’t playing around. It came to rule and entertain, it does both. Easily.

From the opening moments of the film, the tone was set, we knew instantly what we were going to be in for. When the smuggler hit his head on the door frame and knocked himself unconscious as he jumped from the plane, we knew. There was no question that this was going to be a funny and irreverent comedy, nothing after that moment (thirty seconds into the film) was to be taken seriously. We were here to laugh and have fun. Nothing more. The film sports an enormous cast featuring the likes of; Keri Russell, O’Shea Jackson, Alden Ehrenreich, Margo Martindale, and Isiah Whitlock Jr. So many more brilliant people are peppered throughout but the two that deserve mentioning are the hilarious children played by Brooklynn Prince and Christian Convery. Their little side story kept me laughing.

What Cocaine Bear Got Right

The entire feel of this movie, from the costumes to the music, to the bright and colorful locations to the pacing, everything screamed the eighties in the best possible way. They didn’t hold back and nailed an era that is near and dear to my heart. I’ve spoken before about how much I love things set in the eighties, and that will never change. Another thing they really pulled off perfectly was the fine balance between horror and comedy, this film knew exactly what it wanted to be and never tried or pretended to be anything else. It’s a funny comedy that just happens to be very bloody at times. A bear on cocaine will do that.

This film also actually had a story which is something it didn’t even have to do based on the concept. The concept is strong enough to carry us through the 90 minutes yet, the filmmakers added A, B, and C stories, all with their very own arcs and payoffs. The search for the lost little girl, the son just trying to impress his father, the park ranger on a very unconventional first date, and of course the bear partying like it’s, well, the eighties, all had a beginning a middle, and a conclusion—so many threads to pull and somehow they all got neatly tied up at the end.

They really took the gore in places to the next level, limbs are removed and tossed about at will but probably the scene that stood out to me the most was the ambulance chase. That scene had a little bit of everything at once, the comedy was landing beautifully, the tension was jacked to the sky as the bear chased them down the street, and the gore, my god the gore in this scene, especially the end. I won’t ruin exactly what happens but this scene by far encapsulates everything this movie is about. Blood and laughs. It was fantastic.

What Cocaine Bear Got Wrong

While this movie overall was a very fun ride, one thing I can say that it got wrong was some of the humor. I know comedy is subjective but to me, some of the jokes just were not landing. When it was funny it was really funny but at times a joke would fall flat. At one point, I heard a lady in the theater say, “well, they tried.” Of course, that got a laugh and the crowd was back. I would say the percentage of jokes that landed to ones that just kind of happened without reaction is setting at fifty percent. This film has a lot of jokes though so that’s still a lot of laughs.

Another thing that I can say is, and I looked really hard, I didn’t find one costumed hero in the whole movie. Not one person with superhuman abilities showed up with a cracking one-liner and a way to save the day. Is this what movies are becoming? Movies without superheroes? I’m joking of course, this isn’t based on a comic property but it is based on a true story from the past. Reading about what really happened is a wild ride all by itself and if you haven’t looked into it at all, you should. Sometimes reality is truly stranger than fiction.

 Conclusion:

Cocaine Bear had a little bit of everything and I really fell in love with it for that. It was funny, it didn’t take itself too seriously, it had a short runtime of an hour and a half and it packed those ninety minutes with laughs and shocks and gore and somehow even family and heart. It never drags, there aren’t any areas of the movie where I found myself wanting it to move on or take us somewhere else. None of the scenes lasted long enough to get boring it’s as if the pace of the movie itself had done cocaine. It just kept moving. This really was something special that I didn’t expect, usually, movies that hop aboard the hype train fall short of actually reaching the station. That isn’t the case here.

The fact that we got to see Ray Liotta one more time. The fact that a bear did a lot of cocaine and went a bit nuts (like Michael Keaton as Batman). The fact that even with all the jokes and blood and guts it had heart and a story. This movie had so many things that could have held it back but every single one of them ended up being a strength. If you need a brief break from life, these are ninety minutes well spent. You need to see this movie.

Cocaine Bear was released in theaters on February 24th, 2023. 

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