Overview
Doug Glatt, a slacker who discovers he has a talent for brawling is approached by a minor league hockey coach and invited to join the team as the "muscle." Despite the fact that Glatt can't skate his best friend, Pat, convinces him to give it a shot, and Glatt becomes a hero to the team and their fans, until the league's reigning goon becomes threatened by Glatt's success and decides to even the score.
I can’t say Seann William Scott is an actor who would attract me to watch a movie – his highlights are a set of silly roles in well-below-mediocre movies like Dude Where’s My Car, American Loser, and of course the American Pie franchise.
But I did watch Goon, with Scott in the titular role. He plays Doug Glatt, a nice-but-dim bouncer who hasn’t found his ‘thing’ yet, unlike his loudmouthed rude and crude best friend Pat, or his doctor brother. His high achieving parents are predictably disappointed in him as he tries to explain to them that he has neither book smarts nor street smarts, but he does have fist smarts.
And these fist smarts get him from bouncing into ice hockey. Not as a proper hockey player – he is the goon: his role is protect the team’s star player Xavier LaFlamme, basically by taking out any player who threatens his game. Or at least knock a few of their teeth out.
Yes it is a very simple story, with of course a lot of bloody hockey fights, and in particular Pat (Jay Baruchel) is an at times unnecessarily crude character and the movie would probably have been better with a somewhat less obscene but still crazy and outspoken version of Pat.
But for such a silly movie, all other characters have a surprising amount of personality and the movie overall has a lot of heart. Liev Schreiber brings a quiet maturity to his scenes, and he really should have had some more airtime in the story. Sean William Scott manages to consistently stay incredibly nice and incredibly dim throughout the movie, yet the plotlines do progress despite his simpleness.
You do have to buy into the silliness of it all, and then it is a pretty funny film. Certainly better than I had expected. There is even a sequel in the works.
6/10.
