“Novocaine” (2025) refers to the middle school nickname given to a mild-mannered assistant bank manager, Nathan Caine (Jack Quaid), who has a congenital insensitivity to pain (CIP) with Anhidrosis, which means living a very numb life. When the woman of his dreams, a bank teller, Sherry (Amber Midthunder), shows an interest in him, he throws caution to the wind, takes chances and feels alive. When three bank robbers take her hostage, Nathan decides to step even further out of his comfort zone and decides to leverage his disability like a superpower to save her. Will he live long enough to get the love of his life, or will this decision change his life for the worse?
If you enjoy media where an underdog turns the tables on Goliath, then you will root for the love-motivated Nathan. He lives a careful, measured life disassociating, isolating and playing video games. When he gets thrown into a criminal underworld, he is not a good fighter and not clever at navigating it, but he can outlast anyone. Quaid is great in the role because of his dry sense of humor and understated reactions to situations. Also, the more that he fights, he evokes the image of the wimpiest looking guy also being the one who will go from zero to ten and rip someone’s spine out, which is part of the fun. Quaid is the son of Dennis Quaid and Meg Ryan, and in one torture scene, he riffs off his mom’s fake orgasm scene in “When Harry Met Sally…” (1989). He also feels like a glow up of “Beavis and Butthead” with his five head (as opposed to forehead). The superhero storyline is taken to MCU levels when Nathan’s online best friend is revealed, but the scene made Quaid look taller than he ordinarily does. Nathan is like Clark Kent using his suit to disguise his true identity, but instead of a unitard, he is just hiding himself, not a costume, and lays himself bare for love.
The best fight scene is when he is forced to go feral on Zeno (Garth Collins), an underground tattoo artist three times his size. Most characters seem as if they are on something because they are unfazed when they figure out that the dude in the suit is not going down. Zeno gets it and stops short of tapping out because he is too stunned to react. It is also the best fight scene because it shows how resolute Nate is becoming, and there is a sense of growth, but instead of following that evolution after each brutal encounter, “Novocaine” relies on the gore gross out factor more than Nate’s personhood. It is about surviving and saving Sherry.
Midthunder is an appealing actor, and “Novocaine” is one of two movies that she is in today. Her performance in “Opus” (2025) has fewer lines but is even better. I still need to see “Prey” (2022). She plays every facet of her character to elevate her from just being the damsel in distress and has an Amy Winehouse quality in a good way. The character’s storyline felt as if writer Lars Jacobson was hyper conscious of making her empowered, but briefly forgets to do so when production got too hectic. Midthunder and Quaid had great chemistry, and the romantic storyline worked even with all its predictable flaws. If you are concerned about seeing “Novocaine” so soon after “Companion” (2025), have no fear. The proximity of release dates will not create an unintentional association overlap. Unlike “Heart Eyes” (2025), the unlikely combination of genres does not feel seamless, but it definitely takes second place and would have been a good fit for one of the numerous unconventional Valentine’s Day releases.
The detectives following his trail, Mincy (Betty Gabriel) and Coltraine (Matt Walsh), felt like a storyline that could have been cut and may have helped shave off the run time. Comedic actor Walsh is an American treasure but is largely wasted here. If you are a fan, skip “Novocaine” and watch “Not an Artist” (2023). Other than Georgina in “Get Out” (2017), Gabriel seems to get cast as detectives often in “Upgrade” (2018) or authority figures in “It Lives Inside” (2023). Gabriel is great, but seems mismatched with Walsh and could have gone solo, but was underutilized and played an anticlimactic role. Someone, give her a project worthy of her talents!
The rest of “Novocaine” has a series of almost indistinguishable, one note villains, which includes the three bank robbers who occasionally serve as political markers of disgust to distinguish Nathan from other white guys, who are almost uniformly depicted as having issues. Remember that the filmmakers appear to be white men so it could be a deliberate political statement that they are making in a way that no one will notice and does not stick to the bones, but still signals their allegiances. Our favorite, Zeno, sports a tattoo that suggests that Indiana Jones would despise him. Two of the robbers, Ben (Evan Hengst) and Andre (Conrad Kemp), reveal a branch of society normally associated with the disaffected right-wing. Then there is Simon (Ray Nicholson), who seems like the most chill guy in the group but also refuses to stay down and goes a bit off the deep end when the day does not go according to plan. Nicholson, another nepo baby who is leveraging his privilege with talent, was more memorable in “Smile 2” (2024) so do not buy a ticket for him. He did fine, but it would take Michael Fassbender levels of excellence to make his character meatier.
Codirectors Dan Berk and Robert Olsen shoot “Novocaine” like a live action cartoon or comic book adaptation. While they do not shoot in my preferred style, their camera movements often underscore and punctuate how Nathan’s body is handled and enganced the storytelling. There is one scene when Nate’s superhero emerges, and it takes a long time to get there, but they return to Nathan’s quotidian self in a hurry as if the Hays Code is breathing down their neck. If the codirectors and writer have an issue, it may the ability to sustain suspension of disbelief when they make Nathan’s early injuries so bad that it seems impossible to push through even without feeling pain, so the subsequent next level does not escalate the challenge. It may have been helpful if they had organized their wish list of injuries then paced them better because the realism comes in too late. Still the fight scenes slap, but if they were placed in a different sequential order, it would have made the movie better.
With “Novocaine,” thanks to the actors, you get what you expect, but it overstays its welcome and does not know how to wrap it up. If you are looking for a gruesome and entertaining action film, then it is definitely for you, but you will not remember it too long after it ends, which could be perfect for your mood. If you are looking for something deep and less predictable, find another movie. This weekend, there are some terrific releases competing at the box office.
