THE award for the most unserious film of 2024 so far goes to Road House, a remake of the 1989 film with the same name. A modern reimagining of the classic starring Patrick Swayze, Doug Liman’s film comes complete with the inclusion of an unhinged Conor McGregor and Post Malone.
In this updated story, former Ultimate Fighting Championship fighter Elwood Dalton (Jake Gyllenhaal) spends his days scamming underground fight clubs and being suicidal. After being approached by Frankie, the owner of Road House, a beachfront club in Florida, Dalton takes on her job offer as the venue’s bouncer.
He quickly finds himself in the crosshairs of gangsters, a corrupt police force, crime boss Ben Brandt (Billy Magnussen), a crocodile and a maniac baddie in the shape of Knox, played by McGregor.
Pound for pound
Road House’s story is nothing to shout about. Relatively straightforward and predictable, the film instead invests in its humour, performances and action.
The jokes land often, from how scenes comically segue into each other, to the one-liner sarcastic quips by Dalton, which is effective mainly due to Gyllenhaal bringing his A-game to a film that would have floundered if a lesser actor was cast as the lead. Gyllenhaal is an absolute treat to watch and is the only true selling point to Road House.
Unlike how Swayze played Dalton as a stoic monk-like guy, Gyllenhaal’s take on the character is as a ticking time bomb psychopath seconds away from exploding. The character is brought to life by effectively mixing his seething Southpaw performance with his portrayal as a manic, wisecracking criminal in Ambulance.
For the foil to Gyllenhaal’s Dalton, McGregor was cast as Knox, the insane hitman sent to kill him. Just to be clear, as good of a fighter and athlete as he was during his UFC days, McGregor is a terrible actor, but in Road House, that is actually a compliment.
Octagon of visual effects
On that note, Liman leans into his weaknesses from other films too much in Road House, like the overreliance on CGI. For a film that is a remake of a 1989 classic, one would expect the fights to have practical effects and gritty filmmaking, but it does not.
Road House has too many visual effects, such as obvious hidden cuts to make sequences look like they were shot in single take, or the digital edits to mask how the extras and actors are very obviously not hitting each other.
That said, the film’s unnecessarily long two hour runtime justifies itself with its final 30 minutes going extremely hard, featuring a boat chase that climaxes with Road House’s single, excellently choreographed and shot fight sequence to close the film out.
Its faults aside, Road House is proof that, occasionally, films do not need to be deeply meditative or philosophical works of art, because sometimes, Jake Gyllenhaal beating Connor McGregor senseless to Metallica’s “Enter Sandman” is more than enough entertainment for brain cells that just need tuning out for awhile with some mindless fun.
Road House is streaming on Prime Video.
