Robert De Niro burning his way through every shred of goodwill he’d built up from starring in a handful of American classics is nothing I’m new to. Ever since “Meet The Parents” and its awful sequels, I took solace in the fact that at least De Niro was enjoying himself phoning it in. And I could blame it all away on Ben Stiller.
Stallone’s brand of selling out was even easier to swallow and eventually appreciate. After getting his one and only Oscar nod years ago in “Rocky,” he made the commitment to spend the rest of his days playing a living parody of himself quite seamlessly.
“So pairing one old-as-hell actor with plenty-left-in-the-tank-but committed-to-the-art-of-not-giving-a-@#$%, and another old-as-hell actor who stopped giving a @#$% a long time ago? Seems like a win-win!” said one (hopefully fired by now!) producer.
The story centers on two former heavyweight boxing legends from Pittsburgh: Billy “The Kid” McDonnen (DeNiro) and Henry “Razor” Sharp (Stallone), who, before retiring, were involved in an intensely publicized boxing rivalry; a rivalry that reached its boiling point and ended anticlimactically when Sharp chose to publicly retire early, denying McDonnen his chance for a best two-out-of-three match.
Years later, after Sharpe’s inexplicable actions simultaneously ended both his and McDonnen’s boxing careers, slick prompter Dante Slate Jr. (Kevin Hart) reunites the two in the ring one last time as a way to jumpstart his own career as a fight prompter. But before he can get the two bitter rivals into a ring and somehow sell the fight, he’s got to find a way to get the two to even sit together in the same room.
It has all the potential for being a vaguely interesting story, even if it does carry the stench of “been there done that.” And the fact that Stallone and De Niro pay homage, if shallowly, to their famous boxing characters from Rocky and Raging Bull manages to seem almost interesting enough to warrant a sit through.
So you go ahead and sit through it and realize that its biggest demerit isn’t its heavy reliance on cliches that you see coming a mile away; it’s the fact that Stallone and De Niro – when they’re not simply sleepwalking through their paper-thin roles – are either making awfully unfunny, cringe-worthy jokes or being thoroughly unlikeable, unsympathetic assholes.
The film attempts to juggle a light-hearted “comedic tone” (jokes about being old/gay jokes/more jokes about being old/an uncomfortable prison rape joke/more jokes about being old, etc) with a much more somber soap opera tone, failing to really execute either. What results is an uncomfortable, forgettable ride with unlikeable, forgettable characters toward an inevitable end.
If “Grudge Match” were a road trip, with its ending clearly visible from an hour away, the ride would live and die on how much you like anyone in the car with you. And Stallone and De Niro turn out to be every bit as curmudgeonly and dour to be around as you thought they’d be.
Rated:PG-13 for sports action violence, sexual content and language
Runtime: 113 minutes
Grade: D-
