Snitch
Starring: Dwayne Johnson, Rafi Gavron, Jon Bernthal
Directed By: Ric Roman Waugh
Reviewed by Brendan Dousi

[rating: 1.5/5]

It looks like Dwayne ‘Don’t Call Me The Rock’ Johnson is taking a break from invading already established action movie franchises to try and prove he has the dramatic mettle to carry a film on his own. Unfortunately, at this point if Dwayne Johnson isn’t sporting a gun almost as big as he is it just comes off as horrific miscasting.

Snitch starts off with Jason (Rafi Gavron) reluctantly accepting a package of drugs from his friend just for safekeeping. Unfortunately, this friend has set him up to fail and a cavalcade of police officers rain upon and arrest poor Jason. Turns out that Jason is hard working, average joe John Matthews’ (Dwayne Johnson) estranged son from a previous marriage, a son he’s felt he failed. Due to fancy new drug laws, Jason is facing 10 years imprisonment that is unless he can snitch (see what I did there?) on other drug dealers. The only problem is, the only drug dealer he knew snitched on him. John Matthews decides it’s now his problem to fix and approaches new employee and ex-con Daniel James (Jon Bernthal) about getting into the drug game so that he can find someone to snitch on. But, has The Rock bitten off more than he can chew?

The advertising for this film consisted mainly of one poster which featured Dwayne Johnson standing heroically in his bad-ass stance while things crash and explode behind him. It should be said that this is probably the most misleading piece of advertising possible for this film. This kind of poster leads you to expect another ‘The Rock’ action film where he kicks major ass. Turns out Snitch is actually an extremely sub-par dramatic thriller in which The Rock plays an extremely passive and down trodden character. It ends up being quite jarring, considering..

Adding insult to injury, instead of explosive action we’re left with a sub-par and uninspired script glued together with incredibly average performances on all fronts. There’s nothing in this film except a sense of disappointment and the knowledge that it’s been done before and much better than this.

If you’re desperate for a movie and are a fan of the crime drama genre, you could find yourself enjoying this movie but it’s definitely not a ‘must see’ affair. Just be warned, this is not a movie from ‘The Rock’ you know and love, it’s a movie from someone trying too hard to be taken seriously.