Novocaine is a risky endeavor. Comedy lives and dies on how characters react to the extraordinary. Like Deadpool or Kick-Ass, this film derives nearly all its pleasure from watching Quaid take punishment as he either ignores the injuries or feigns pain to confuse his captors. The directors delight in pulling off his fingernails and scalding him with coffee, but the movie itself is too anodyne to make something special from the unique premise. The world Nathan inhabits is sparse, with the directors opting not to do anything with the film’s Christmastime setting, offering bland cinematography filled with empty space and clichéd dialogue that fails to carry the movie through its early stretches.
Despite the high concept, Novocaine feels as risk-averse as its protagonist, afraid to go full-on action-comedy or veer hard into torture porn. Writer Lars Jacobson constructs the film around Nathan’s transformation from a man of fear into a man of action, fighting a psychopathic Ray Nicholson, who spends the movie trying to turn his sadistic kingpin into anything other than another nameless goon. As far as the other characters go, the directors appear less confident dealing with the blossoming love affair than they do with sticking Quaid’s hand in a deep fryer. This makes any scene lacking physical violence interminably slow and devoid of charm. Quaid, whose dopey face makes for a solid stress ball, keeps things moving even as he’s deprived of reactions to the heightened scenario around him. He’s almost completely disassociated from his body, which keeps him from playing up the humor of the situation.
In the second half, though, the movie starts to gel together, giving Nathan actual stakes to respond to. He tumbles through an action movie, complete with a kitchen brawl, a Nazi tattoo parlor, and a booby-trapped house that would make Kevin McCallister jealous. There’s a bit of Jackass fun to be had in watching Nathan’s body break down, but Novocaine doesn’t know what to do when he isn’t taking damage. Shots of Nathan’s fingernails being peeled off are chased with meandering cutscene-like interludes of Nathan receiving further instruction from Detective Minsy (Betty Gabriel), who, alongside an underused Matt Walsh, follows his bloody trail. The Grand Theft Auto plotting isn’t always a bad thing, nor is the influence of video games inherently a detriment. From Crank’s chaos to Hundreds Of Beavers’s creativity, video games have frequently given filmmakers new ways of constructing tired narratives. But Novocaine too heavily relies on Quaid’s ironic detachment, which sells out the premise and its tension.
But the star is also the thing that keeps the movie going. By the third act, he’s running off pure adrenaline, using EpiPens as power-ups to mend his rapidly depleting HP, and wearing injuries like an extra in Dawn Of The Dead. With an arrow through the knee, glass in his knuckles, and a bone sticking out of his wrist, Nathan’s deterioration fuels the movie, turning injuries into weapons and a disability into a strength. But the film takes too long to get there, limping on a zero-to-hero narrative that could stand to feel either a little more sincere or a lot more sadistic. For such a promising premise, Novocaine is too painless to leave a lasting mark.
Director: Dan Berk, Robert Olsen
Writer: Lars Jacobson
Starring: Jack Quaid, Amber Midthunder, Ray Nicholson, Jacob Batalon, Betty Gabriel, Matt Walsh
Release Date: March 14, 2025
