Baywatch

Baywatch is a film of bits. Some of those bits are funny, but the unfunny bits outnumber the funny, so mathematically the film is a failure. And yet, it is a film that’s hard to dislike. The humour comes largely from the mismatched partners in lifeguarding Mitch Buchannon (Dwayne Johnson) and Matt Brody (Zac Efron), whose comedic bantering offers some surges of laughter, while slightly damper laughs come from the schlubby Ronnie Greenbaum (Jon Bass) and his crush on CJ Parker (Kelly Rohrbach) that is the source of much awkwardness. Aside from that, references to the TV show (complete with cameos) are laboured while the drug dealing plot needs more than CPR to make it move. But despite the bagginess of Damien Shannon and Mark Swift’s script, Seth Gordon’s direction has enough straight-faced absurdity to keep the film moving, and every time he is on screen, Johnson’s charisma enervates the potentially soggy material. Baywatch is far from a cresting wave, but its comedic current is diverting enough.

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