What The Rock is cookin' smells like a box office winner. Though purportedly based on actual events, “Walking Tall” — a remake of a 1973 film that starred Joe Don Baker — is about as believable a yarn as the one about the dog who ate the homework. What the film lacks in plausibility, however, it more than makes up for with pure adrenaline. Watching The Rock relentlessly pound the stuffing out of the bad guys will no doubt help moviegoers vicariously mitigate their own concession stand price-related anger. As the special forces stud who takes on a town full of crooks, the former pro wrestling champ serves notice that he is Hollywood’s biggest action hero. If he keeps it up, he might someday be governor of California.
After a seven-year stint in the military, Chris Vaughn (The Rock) has returned home to his rustic hometown in the Pacific Northwest to discover that the place has fallen apart. His high school rival, Jay Hamilton (Neal McDonough), has shut down the old mill and is running an illegal drug ring out of a casino. After taking a serious beating at the hands of Hamilton’s thugs, Vaughn decides to run for sheriff and clean up the town. With his childhood pal Ray (Johnny Knoxville) as his only deputy, Vaughn dispenses justice with a vengeance, leading — of course — to the ultimate showdown with his arch-nemesis.
Okay, so he’s not Laurence Olivier, but The Rock certainly acquits himself well as the town’s pumped-up savior. The guy’s got personality — screen presence — and his comedic timing is precise. He imbues Vaughn with enough old-fashioned American probity to cover up his lack of emotional availability. Then again, who needs emotion when you’ve got all that muscle mass. Pairing The Rock with Johnny Knoxville was a stroke of casting genius. The former MTV star is one entertaining jackass. (Rated PG-13 for sequences of intense violence, sexual content, drug material and language. Running time: 86 minutes)
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on April 2, 2004. Read the original PDF.