Film review: Wicklow-filmed Cocaine Bear embodies the ridiculous - and the sublime

"Elizabeth Banks’ directorial debut is a hoot, providing you’re willing to overlook some sketchy CGI – and really, who knows what a coke-fuelled bear on the rampage might look like?"

Fri, 24 Feb, 2023 - 17:58

Declan Burke

Cocaine Bear
★★★☆☆

Cocaine Bear (18s) is based – very loosely, one imagines – on true events in a Georgia National Park in 1985, when a drug dealer parachuted bundles of cocaine out of a plane that crash-landed shortly after. Crime boss Syd (Ray Liotta, in his final role) wants his coke back lest his Colombian partners get feisty, but he’s up against ferocious opposition: a 500-pound black bear, discovering a split package of cocaine, inhales the devil’s dandruff and takes off on a murderous spree.

That’s bad news for Daveed (O’Shea Jackson Jnr) and Eddie (Alden Ehrenreich), who are dispatched to retrieve Syd’s stash, and also Sari (Keri Russell), whose young daughter Dee-Dee (Brooklyn Prince), who has gone wandering into the woods to do some painting…

Elizabeth Banks’ directorial debut is a hoot, providing you’re willing to overlook some sketchy CGI – and really, who knows what a coke-fuelled bear on the rampage might look like? – and you’re the kind of movie fan who delights in the sight of Margo Martindale in a role that’s one part Park Ranger and two parts pistol-packin’ mama.

With its cast of off-beat characters, useless criminals and a coke-addled bear wreaking all kinds of havoc, and dialogue that takes goofiness to a whole new level, Cocaine Bear – filmed in the Wicklow mountains – is so ridiculous that it’s almost sublime. (cinema release)