Benny Safdie’s MMA Film "The Smashing Machine" Is 2025’s Weirdest Movie
- Dan Lalonde
- Mar 27
- 2 min read
Every sport has its own film that captures the spirit what the sport is about whether it's Field Of Dreams for baseball, The Mighty Ducks for hockey, Remember The Titans for football, and Hoosiers for basketball. Warrior starring Tom Hardy may not only be the best MMA film but my pick for the best sports movie ever made.
When Benny Safdie screens a movie in secret, you know it’s not going to be ordinary. His latest directorial effort, The Smashing Machine, just had its second hush-hush showing—and according to those in the know, it’s one of the strangest cinematic experiences of 2025.
On paper, The Smashing Machine sounds like a gritty biopic.
It stars Dwayne Johnson as MMA legend Mark Kerr, a man whose meteoric rise and devastating battles with addiction were already explored in the powerful 2002 documentary The Smashing Machine: The Life and Times of Extreme Fighter Mark Kerr. But Safdie throws that playbook out the window.
Sources describe the film as “indescribable in tone and style,” bordering on a spoof of the biopic genre. One viewer even labeled it “gonzo filmmaking”—raw, chaotic, and totally unfiltered. Think less Oscar bait, more fever dream.
Johnson’s performance reportedly plays it straight, while the rest of the movie swerves into strange, experimental territory. According to one attendee, “It’s as if his performance belongs in a different movie.” That tension—between sincerity and absurdity—might be what makes The Smashing Machine so compelling. Or polarizing.
Emily Blunt co-stars in the $40 million A24 production, which wrapped in summer 2024. So far, only one official image has been released. With its unconventional tone, the film seems more suited to a bold European film festival than a crowd-pleaser like TIFF.
One thing’s for sure: The Smashing Machine is not the film audiences think they’re getting. And that might be the best part.
Source: World Of Reel
Photo Credit: A24
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