With only five lines of dialogue in the entire film, Motor City plays out like a mix between Sam Peckinpah, John Woo, and Buster Keaton. It's a visceral thrill so committed to a stylistic gimmick that it makes us question who needs dialogue anyway.
The plot, in all its simplicity, is the story of boy meets girl, boy beats the hell out of girl's abusive ex, ex turns out to be a drug lord who frames the boy for a crime he didn't commit, boy loses girl, boy gathers a personal army to take revenge.
You know, the usual.
Sure, it's a little long, and yes, some of its methods to keep the gag going are a little twee. But it rarely matters when things are this much fun.
A big reason why all of this works is Alan Ritchson, an often underutilized and always charismatic actor who knows how to make the most of his mammoth frame. A lesser performer would settle for unstoppable brute force. Ritchson, instead, allows himself to be vulnerable and emotional, even when it would be easier to act macho.
As a result, Motor City finds its heart and soul in Ritchson's face and eyes, which convey pain and a longing for revenge better than any action montage.
Which isn't to say the film lacks action, far from it. Motor City is an unrelenting thrill. A stylistic knockout of epic proportions. It leans into the gratuitous to deliver the same kind of love letter to Detroit that Michael Bay would have made for heartland Americana.
Watch, for example, how eagerly the film stages greased-up men in tight shirts working heavy machinery as if it were an ultra-violent version of Dirty Dancing. It's fun to see equal opportunity eye candy this way. Especially as action films of this kind are pornographic in their own way to begin with.
After the screening, I heard some were burnt out by the excessive, non-stop-barrage of style. Personally, I couldn't get enough of it. As with Michael Bay or Baz Luhrmann, director Potsy Ponciroli finds nuance in maximalism. The whole thing plays out like a Meatloaf song, where everything is a chorus, but it speaks to a teenage sensibility that some never grow out of.
Add to that the pulse-pounding action, including a whopper of a fight in an elevator, solid work from fantastic character actors, and a heck of a silly finale, and Motor City turns into one of the most purely entertaining action thrillers of the year.
Interested in other films that premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival? Check out my full coverage here:
Joonatan Itkonen
