‘Rampage’: The Rock in a hard place

He’s particularly close with George, a rare albino silverback gorilla that, we come to learn, has been in his care since he rescued the then-young primate from poachers.

Dwayne Johnson caught up with Yahoo! Loosely based on the classic 1986 arcade game of the same name, Rampage is director Brad Peyton’s third outing with Dwayne Johnson and second major foray into the world of major blockbuster destruction, after 2015’s natural disaster flick San Andreas – and honestly? One night, however, he comes across a foreign object that fell from the sky and when he touches the box, it emits a gas that infects George making him grow at a rapid pace and become more aggressive. Rampage is a 32-year-old title that had players control giant animal monsters leveling a city for the sheer quarter-guzzling joy of it, and it could never be accused of having a lengthy lore attached to it.

Meanwhile, at the headquarters of the Very Evil Company that developed CRISPR, the scheming mannish sister Claire (Malin Akerman) and sniveling brother Brett (Jack Lacy) confer. I would read every book on filmmaking and watch every interview, and I remember seeing an interview with Dwayne for the “Gridiron Gang”, and I thought to myself, ‘Man, he seems like a genuinely good person’. Malin Akerman and Jake Lacy are a pair of hilarious villains, the sneeringly evil sibling corporate bigwigs.

Johnson is about to release a new video game adaptation, Rampage – and he reckons they got this one right. Genetic editing? Sure-but we are not enlightened about what the genetic editing really is and how they managed to achieve it in the movie. Davis ditches the skinny boys and teams up with Kate Caldwell (Harris), a disgraced geneticist who makes a far better foil for him, not least because Harris is the best part of this thing by a mile. The downside of his performance, however, may be that he appears to be just too capable.

So if you play headquarters, get those extra lives ready – here’s a trick to do that – and if you love trivia, seriously, why haven’t you downloaded headquarters yet?

Maybe it’s video game insecurity. Personally though, I think his most impressive career achievement has to be “turd polisher”. It all looks animated but that’s how they do these movies now.

I am always impressed with motion capture and the actors who portray various creatures and Liles does a terrific job of emoting through facial expressions. It’s undoubtedly the biggest lead role for Harris in terms of the scale of this movie, and she more than matches the huge presence of her co-star. Playing Agent Russell (from the OGA or “Other Government Agency”), he can’t stop reminding us that he’s just a good ol’ cowboy – and just in case you forget that little fact, he’s sporting a silver belt buckle and a gun with a pearl handle.

Actually, check that – “lite” isn’t really fair, not when the spectacularly chaotic final act delivers to such a satisfying degree.

Jeffrey Dean Morgan among others, and it is out this week.

I guess if you wanted to have a gorilla, wolf and lizard, you’d have to give the game credit.

Hitting theaters this weekend, tracking numbers-which can be notoriously inaccurate at times-peg Rampage for a domestic opening between $35 million and $40 million against a reported $115 million budget.