PAIN & GAIN

In Pain & Gain, the witty, savvy, almost perfectly pitched new release by Michael Bay, Mark Wahlberg plays a dimwitted personal trainer who decides he'd rather steal than pursue the American dream, and - .

Yes, I just used "witty," "savvy," and "almost perfectly pitched" to describe a Michael Bay movie. Trust me, you're not as shocked as I am.

Music

The 4onthefloor

Rock Island Brewing Company

Friday, April 19, 9:30 p.m.

On April 19, the Rock Island Brewing Company hosts an evening with The 4onthefloor, the Minneapolis-based blues-rock outfit noted for all of its songs being written in 4/4 time, and for each of the group's musicians playing a bass drum. Band member James Gould has called this format "limiting in a way that really forces you to be more creative." Which is exactly how I describe my writing talents ... but usually without that "creative" part.

42

42, writer/director Brian Helgeland's dramatization of three years in the life of baseball trailblazer Jackie Robsinson, is an earnest, deliberately old-fashioned entertainment, an inspirational bio-pic made with professionalism and care but little in the way of emotional or thematic nuance - it's the very definition of what-you-see-is-what-you-get filmmaking. In three specific scenes, though, this seemingly prototypical triumph-of-the-underdog sports flick also achieves a legitimate, rousing greatness, and it's the sort of expansive and lingering greatness that makes you leave the picture feeling, with few reservations, that the movie as a whole was truly great.

EVIL DEAD

While I like the movie just fine, I'm not enough of a fanatic for Sam Raimi's 1981 splatter classic The Evil Dead to get in a twist about the existence of director Fede Alvarez's new, definite-article-free remake Evil Dead. (It's when Hollywood inevitably remakes Raimi's priceless horror sequel Evil Dead II that we're gonna have problems.) But despite being mostly entertained by Alvarez's beyond-bloody outing, especially during its second half, I do have to question the decision to make it, for so much of its length, so bloody serious. This is a film, after all, in which a demon is released by a supernatural incantation, nail guns and electric carving knives are the weapons of choice, and one character escapes a (more-)dreadful fate by enacting a speedier version of 127 Hours. How are we not asked to laugh at all this?