Review - Pressure

Starring Andrew Scott, Brendan Fraser, Kerry Condon, Damian Lewis. Screenplay by David Haig and Anthony Maras. Directed by Anthony Maras. Rated PG-13. 100 minutes. In theaters.

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I think I’m too old to get the Brendan Fraser thing. I missed the window. Don’t get me wrong, it’s perfectly natural for people to have an outsized affection for actors who were in stuff they watched a lot as little kids. It’s why I still get insanely happy every time I see Jackie Earle Haley in something. Or Paul Le Mat. But by the time “Encino Man” came out, I was already a pretentious 17-year-old art snob who wouldn’t be caught dead sitting through a Pauly Shore picture. I also somehow managed to miss both “Mummy” movies and most of those other inessential-looking comedies that made Fraser a beloved icon of millennial nostalgia. (Though I recall finding him charming in “George of the Jungle.”)

So from the outside looking in, this whole “Brendan Fraser is a serious, Academy Award-winning actor” comeback train is deeply bizarre. The amount of generosity required to not die of embarrassment while watching “The Whale” is beyond me. There was something unseemly about the condescending kudos bestowed upon Fraser as he blubbered and sobbed his way through awards season that year, a Make-a-Wish vibe I found extremely off-putting. The whole thing seems to have gotten out of hand, especially given how terrible he is in “Pressure.” Fraser’s floundering turn as General Dwight D. Eisenhower has got to be one of the most distractingly awful performances I’ve ever seen in an otherwise enjoyable movie.