It was the 1990s. Daniel Lugo (Mark Wahlberg) is a body builder and personal fitness trainer with big dreams. Unfortunately, he had bad ideas to achieve these dreams. Together with two other muscle-head friends, Adrian (Anthony Mackie) and Paul (Dwayne Johnson), he kidnaps and extorts money from one of his rich clients Victor Kershaw (Tony Shaloub). Plans do not exactly go as planned and instead leads to a series of over-the-top murder and mayhem as only director Michael Bay could give us. That this preposterous story was actually based on a crime that happened in real life was an incredible aspect of the film.
The movie is really about very serious heinous crimes, but the writers make it black comedy material by focusing on the stupid planning and bumbling actions of the three muscle-bound perpetrators of these crimes. I enjoyed the first half of the movie when the comedy was actually there on the screen, especially with Tony Shaloub and Rebel Wilson (as Adrian's nurse and girlfriend) there. However, when The Rock's character Paul becomes a cocaine addict which leads to their gang's downward spiral, the film also spirals downward, loses its sense of fun and becomes difficult to watch.
The movie is really about very serious heinous crimes, but the writers make it black comedy material by focusing on the stupid planning and bumbling actions of the three muscle-bound perpetrators of these crimes. I enjoyed the first half of the movie when the comedy was actually there on the screen, especially with Tony Shaloub and Rebel Wilson (as Adrian's nurse and girlfriend) there. However, when The Rock's character Paul becomes a cocaine addict which leads to their gang's downward spiral, the film also spirals downward, loses its sense of fun and becomes difficult to watch.