The Emotional Intelligence Of CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE

Central Intelligence is among the most skillful movies ever made to deliver a message. It is subtle in communicating its progressive points. On the surface, it is an action-comedy buddy flick starring Dwayne Johnson, formerly known as “the Rock,” as a secret agent who shows up again in middle age, having disappeared as a high school senior; and as his only friend, Kevin Hart, portraying a mild-mannered accountant whose best days where as the “Golden Jet,” star of the track team as well as the drama club, not to mention homecoming king and student body president.

But underneath that high concept pitch are arguments against bullying, homophobia, and sexual harassment, and a demonstration of the racial equality of two African American leads in a big-budget, mainstream release.

How Do You Recover from the Humiliation of High School?

The opening scene is remarkable for more than its effects. Johnson’s face has been digitally de-aged and grafted onto the body of Sione Kelepi, a social media sensation as a dancer who happens to be short and overweight. Together they form the young Robbie Weirdicht. He is humiliated by the tough guys of the class of 1996. While he is showering in the locker room, they capture him and toss him, wet and naked, into the morning assembly, in front of what may as well be the whole world.

He has no choice but to drop out thereafter. The only person in the gymnasium who displays any kindness is the “Golden Jet,” who lends his peer his letter jacket to cover up. That act makes him a lifelong hero. The first few minutes, by themselves, could be a public service warning about bullying, especially since the audience likely won’t be able to keep themselves from at least a guilty guffaw.

From that set up, the caper is ready. Hart’s “Golden Jet,” real name Calvin Joyner, is whiling away another day at the office, having found out he was passed over for a promotion given to his former assistant, when he receives a friend request on Facebook from “Bob Stone.” That is the upgraded version of the victim of teen persecution. When they meet, the now consummate specimen of masculinity explains that his evolution was achieved by working out six hours a day, every day, for twenty years straight, which, he claims deadpan, anybody could emulate. (The line no doubt is a deliberate echo of the real attempts by ordinary guys to imitate Johnson.)

In addition to being impossibly buff, he is exceptionally guileless. He wears a unicorn t-shirt and fanny pack, and he means it — the style is neither ironic nor nostalgic. He is too earnest. His former partner in counterintelligence operations could not tolerate his upbeat innocence. He even aspired to be like Molly Ringwald in Sixteen Candles. He imagined himself being courted by Jake Ryan in a red Porsche as in that John Hughes definitive teen hit.

The trauma of bullying is the secret, the real reason for Stone’s demeanor. He denies it, as he must, but his life has been set on its course by the torment he suffered. So he remains stuck in adolescence. He developed late.

Can Humor Be Serious?

Thus the juxtaposition of Hart and Johnson is not what it seems. Stone looks up to, figuratively though not literally, Joyner. Apparently it was a challenge to frame them well in widescreen format, since there is over one foot of height difference between the co-stars and too much width of image to fill in. They have the rapport needed for the plot.

The screenwriters’ light touch with the serious theme is apparent with the apology offered by the main perpetrator, with the bonus of the impeccable casting of a smarmy Jason Bateman. The protagonists encounter him in his adult version, as they must, and the contrivance is no less plausible than other fictitious coincidences. He says he is sorry: since he has become a born-again Christian, he hasn’t had a day without remembering that fateful moment . . . until he declares he deserves an Oscar for his performance. He is unrepentant.

The mission for which Stone recruits Joyner involves recovering data of national security importance before it is auctioned off, with a team of spies led by a female boss (Amy Ryan) joining the chase. They believe, whether erroneously or not, that Stone is the rogue who has stolen the information.

There is as explicit a rejection of homophobia as could be set forth in this context. Stone and the “Golden Jet” fend off random guys who threaten a bar brawl, with common taunts about sexual orientation. They even exchange an actual kiss, when Stone, in disguise as a marriage counselor, suggests a role play in which he will pretend to be Joyner’s wife. The emotional bond between them, with Stone being demonstrative as a “hugger,” is too poignant to be realistic among men in contemporary cinema. (The last comparable example from the States would be the leads in the 1995 drama Smoke, and that was an independent release.)

There also is repudiation of sexual harassment. A co-worker (Ryan Hansen) at the accounting firm that employs Joyner is a lecher and hypocrite. He is simply tasered by the no-nonsense spy boss when he comes onto her.

A rarity in film, however, is the pairing of an African American with another African American. Marketing calculations would suggest, as has become indeed popular, a black and white duo as in the Lethal Weapon series with Mel Gibson and Danny Glover or Hart himself opposite much taller, much paler Will Ferrell in Get Hard. In this instance, racial issues are handled deftly. White women are attracted to Stone, and we can add “why would they not be?” Joyner talks about black people going to the barbershop (or watching the movie Barbershop) rather than trying marital therapy with a counselor, but his marriage is as “buppie” as could be.

The script relies on the self-conscious cultural allusions, just shy of breaking the fourth wall, to avoid being too sentimental. The reappropriation of Sixteen Candles, which unites Stone with Harold Lee (John Cho) from the Harold and Kumar franchise since both hold it up as a favorite, no doubt is attempted because, not in spite of, its egregious stereotype of the Asian foreign exchange student.

The achievement is to be funny. A South Asian clerk (Kumail Nanjiani), for example, takes to task Joyner for mocking East Asian (specifically Korean) penis size, in a scene that features the surprise of a literal snake, a very large one that scares the diminutive Hart, whose stature is integral to his schtick. For the devotee of videos that have gone viral on the internet, there is even a shout out to the honey badger, a species whose nastiness is extolled in a hilarious amateur documentary that was making the rounds when this production was in the works.

Should Movies Deliver a Message?

Central Intelligence is not perfect. It has the problem of tone inherent to any movie that mixes humor with anything else. The gun violence is troubling, not because it is too wanton but because it is too realistic. If it were more over-the-top, it would be less unsettling in an era of mass shootings.

The message movie was once a staple. Birth of a Nation belongs to the category, as reprehensible as its achievement. So do Leni Refinstahl’s oeuvre and Judgment at Nuremberg, the former celebrating Nazism and the latter condemning it. Spike Lee is the most acclaimed practitioner in the genre nowadays, even when he is not overt as in Jungle Fever and Do the Right Thing.

It has become a cliche that success in high school is sure to lead to failure in later life. The story told in this Hollywood production is that the opposite is as likely. A sequel was rumored but is said to be on hold. That is just as well. It would be difficult to incorporate the same subtext as persuasively. Perhaps others will be inspired by the possibility of presenting positive messages.

Does Central Intelligence effectively fight back against bullying? Or does it exploit the theme for commercial purposes?

Central Intelligence was released on June 17, 2016.