[DVD Review (R1)] THE HAMMER
To be absolutely honest with you, I first encountered The Hammer under rather difficult circumstances. A few years back I’d written a screenplay called ‘Blue Corner’ that was semi-autobiographical mixed with a heavy dose of wish fulfilment. I kept on with second, third and fourth drafts, sending each out to the network of people I share my work with in order to get feedback. One of those people, out in Chicago, sent me an e-mail saying that the latest draft was eerily similar to a indie film Adam Carolla was going into production with. My back immediately arched and I considered calling in the lawyers, just like I did when I wrote that screenplay, “Rex Flexal & The Wonderful Murderous Themepark of Dinosaurs”, only to see Jurassic Park released a few years later (snark! snark!). Someone managed to get a copy of the screenplay for The Hammer to me and I read it with great trepidation, only to find that not only was it too far removed from the screenplay I had written to be considered a rip-off (plus, how truly likely is that my rather amateurish writings would find them into the hands of the very funny Carolla?) but that it did better, more sophisticated, funnier and more original things with the admittedly similar story idea. However, after reading the script I liked it enough to put the film on my ‘radar’ so that I could check it out when it was finally released.
The Hammer comes to Region 1 DVD after a short cinema run. Despite good critical word of mouth, the film was going to be released straight to DVD until Adam Carolla insisted it be released on the big screen and put up around $300,000 of his own money for prints and promotion to fund a limited release.
How did it do on its journey from the screenplay I read to the final result on the screen?
Adam Carolla plays Jerry Ferro, whose 40th birthday has brought his life into sharp focus and it’s not a pretty picture. A once-promising amateur boxer, who quit so he wouldn’t risk his perfect record of underachievement, Jerry has been knocking around from one construction job to another and ’spinning his wheels’ in an unsatisfying relationship, all the while with an eye toward eventually getting his act together. His last connection to the fight game is the evening boxing class he teaches to middle-aged, middle class, middle management types at a gym in Pasadena, where he also works as a handyman. When venerable boxing coach Eddie Bell asks Jerry if he’d like to spar a couple of rounds with Malice Blake, an up-and-coming pro, Jerry reluctantly steps into the ring. Despite the ass-kicking Jerry otherwise receives, a one-punch knockdown of Blake convinces Jerry that it’s time to make his return to competitive boxing. Thus ends a 20-year layoff and begins a hilarious fish-out-water quest for Olympic gold.
The Hammer is a story close to Carolla’s heart in the same way that ‘Blue Corner’ was close to mine. My screenplay was very much drenched in the frustrations of where my own life was/is mixed with a little “day-dream” element involving “one last great fight”. In Carolla’s case he really was a high-ranking light-heavyweight boxer and a highly skilled carpenter. He really did live the life evidenced in the movie, to the point that his barely-intelligible best friend in real life portrays his barely-intelligible best friend in the film. Furthermore, the gym featured in the movie was actually built by Carolla and Oswaldo Castillo (”Ossie”) during his years as a carpenter. After completing the gym, Carolla instructed the morning boxing class and Castillo was hired as the maintenance guy.
I liked The Hammer a great deal. It’s a little rough around the edges, as you’d expect from a low-budget indie, and it abandons its admirably cynical tone towards the end of the third act for revelations and developments that go a little bit twee and sugary, contrasting too sharply against all that has gone before it. On the page this didn’t stand out as much as it does on the screen.
However, there’s not an unlikeable performance in the entire film - even from those playing unlikeable characters. There’s also a plethora of great zingers, observations and witticisms to get your gut shaking. Best of all, it’s a movie that all fans of ‘underdog movies’ will love without relying too heavily on the conventions of this subgenre. Yeah, there’s a little too many montages (even though some are played brilliantly for laughs) but The Hammer goes off in enough fresh and involving directions without turning into a comedic version of Rocky or frustrating you, the viewer.
I empathised with the character Adam Carolla played and who he invented. His present situation and his outlook regarding it is eerily similar to my own at present and I kind of got a lot more out of this film as a result, probably more so then the average viewer going in cold. I’d throw down ‘four popcorns’ on this film quite easily but I’m very aware that a lot of what I loved about it is personable to me and my current issues so I’ll stand outside of that for a second and deduct half a ‘popcorn’.
My friend Porter watched this with me and although he laughed heartily and regularly throughout I don’t think he’d describe it as anything stronger than “likeable”. Me? I dug the hell out of it and thought it did a great deal with a simple, over-used concept. It’s a little gem of a flick that I urge you all to check out if you get the chance.
Plus, just be thankful that this is out there and not ‘Blue Corner’ because, despite being the author of the latter, even I’ll admit that this is way better then anything I’d put forward regarding the same story!
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