I am so not a Michael Bay fan. I find everything he does to be way over the top. Bay doesn’t seem to trust his story or the characters and his latest film, ‘Pain And Gain’ is no exception.

‘Pain And Gain’ is the true story of Miami’s Sun Gym gang, which was made up of three super violent, super inept, body builders, who decide the best way to get rich quick is to kidnap millionaires and milk them out of their fortune. Now why haven’t I thought of that?

It’s the 90’s and the three muscle bound jerks are Daniel Lugo (Mark Wahlberg), Born again Jesus, coke freak, Paul Doyle (Dwayne Johnson aka The Rock) and the not so bright, Adrian Doorbal (Anthony Mackie).

In flashbacks we meet Lugo who after being released from prison for committing a white collar crime, gets a job as a personal trainer at Sun Gym in Miami.

He believes however, that he is destined for far greater things.

One day, Lugo attends a seminar, led by inspirational speaker, Johnny Wu (Ken Jeong) and his life is changed forever. Lugo is determined to become a a ‘doer’…(a term coined by Wu)

Now what is Lugo’s idea of being a ‘doer’? For one thing, it doesn’t involve training rich people at the gym. It does involve, kidnapping them.

He enlists Doyle and Doorbal in his scheme and their first target is Lugo’s client, self made millionaire Victor Kershaw. The plan…kidnap Kershaw and get him to sign over all his property, bank accounts, etc.

After several failed attempts at snatching Kershaw, these bubbling idots finally succeed. This leads to lots of torture scenes, over the top violence, and excessive close-ups. The characters, who start out funny, except for Kershaw, quickly become caricatures.

The film, billed as an action comedy, has the action, but not so much the funny and it doesn’t take long for Michael Bay’s B movie style of directing, to wear thin.

Rounding out the cast is Ed Harris, as a retired cop who comes onboard to investigate Kershaw’s claim of being kidnapped, after the police refuse to believe him and the extremely funny, Rebel Wilson as Mackie’s wife.

‘Pain And Gain’ written by Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeeling is based on a series of magazine articles penned by Pete Collins, which appeared in the Miami New Times in late 1999.

The film opens in theatres, Friday April 26th, 2013.

I gave it 2 1/2 bagels out of 5. Check out our video for John’s rating and more of our bantering.