The saying that “nice guys finish last” reflects a common idea in today’s dating culture.
It’s the lamentation you hear coming from men who feel that the women available to date are simply too caught up in the charm and egotism of jerks and pretty boys to notice the things that matter. Thus, the golden character and stalwart patience of the last few “good guys” out there (i.e. the speakers, in most cases) is left to rot, unappreciated by the poor, misguided women they so desperately want to protect.
As you might have guessed, the entire idea is utter crap; it exists today largely only as a myth spread by ill-intentioned male influencers seeking to create the perception of loneliness and polarize men against women for no other reason than to get more inane clicks. It has no place in adult society, and it certainly has no place in movie theaters.
Fortunately for those low enough to blame the opposite sex for their problems, there’s now an even lower form of entertainment: “Novocaine.”
The action-comedy follows overly cautious bank middle manager Nathan Caine (Jack Quaid) as he battles to save the woman he believes to be the love of his life, Sherry (Amber Midthunder), from a trio of ruthless bank robbers. The kicker? He has a genetic disorder that means he can’t feel pain, so he makes use of his numb nerves to take a truckload of punishment — all while maintaining his bumbling good nature and determination to find the kidnappers’ ringleader (Ray Nicholson).
Over the course of the film, Nate somehow graduates from a ho-hum worrywart, too afraid of biting off his own tongue to chew solid food, into a reluctant action hero. And if this self-pitying nonsense of a character arc wasn’t bad enough, then his relationship with Sherry all but confirms the story’s misguided intentions.
The film attempts to swerve around tropiness and give Midthunder more to do than sit in damseldom, but its attempts to subvert expectations ultimately crash and burn, further fueling the flames of its cheeky chauvinism.
The lens through which “Novocaine” is viewed looks awfully similar to the tint of your average so-called nice guy: it’s a world where everyone seems to ignore the unflinching kindness of our hero while treating women with nothing but contempt — even women themselves, it would seem.
When faced with such a predicament, why, it seems only natural that one should take up bloody, single-minded vigilantism and fight for the object of one’s feelings — by, in a not-so-ironic twist, not feeling anything at all.
Even if you try to ignore its morally unfounded premise for the sake of fun, though, you’ll find that the film’s central arc is the kind that just sort of happens, jumping from beginning to end with one giant ellipsis of intense action, superfluous humor and forgettable supporting characters hazily interjected in between.
In fact, a lot of things in “Novocaine” seem to just sort of happen. The jury is still out on whether Ray Nicholson’s manic deliveries justify studio efforts to intentionally plant his feet in his father’s footsteps, but he’s at least the only one here doing things with his performance that you didn’t see coming five slow seconds in advance.
He even usurps Quaid as the superior nepo baby of the project; the latter gives a standard Jack Quaid performance in a movie whose only request was for a halfway decent one, but that’s about all that can be said on the matter.
Directors Dan Berk and Robert Olsen come to life during action sequences, with a nice balance between satisfying camera sweeps and all-important visual clarity. The greatest compliment I can give the film is that some moments hit that magical sweet spot where you almost forget you’re watching a movie and not anxiously spectating a real-life death brawl.
In every non-fight sequence, though, the film conveys action as plainly as can be expected. Its lighting is more consistently serviceable than some of its mid-budget peers, but competency is a far cry from imagination in this case, and the same can be said of its blunt script.
Take, for example, a scene early in the film where Nate and Sherry attend an independent art exhibition. What needle drop did the filmmakers choose to convey the hip, underground nature of the event? “Casual” by Chappell Roan.
Ultimately, “Novocaine” is a film that likes to pick and choose what matters. When it comes to f-bombs and gross-out gore, it drives its hard-R rating around the block like a new Corvette; when it reaches its lone intimate scene, it cuts away quickly, having shown the absolute bare minimum amount of skin needed to qualify as sexy.
The only sources of fun and meaning in the film are monopolized by violence, blood and male wish-fulfillment. It’s porn for the souls of the lonely and uninitiated, but it also can’t even manage to hold your eyes’ and ears’ attention concurrently.
And when a film chooses to center itself with a sludgy style and exploitative thematic mission, one is forced to conclude that nothing in “Novocaine” matters much at all. Nice guys might not finish last, but they don’t make very compelling action flicks, either.
“Novocaine” releases in theaters on March 14, 2025.
Kevin Lynch can be reached at lync1832@stthomas.edu.
