‘Cocaine Bear’ ready to strike a blow to staid Hollywood
NEW YORK – On Dec. 22, 1985, The Associated Press reported the following from Blue Ridge, Georgia:
“Investigators searching for cocaine dropped by an airborne smuggler have found a ripped-up shipment of the sweet-smelling powder and the remains of a bear that apparently died of a multimillion-dollar high.”
Police found a sad scene. A 175pound black bear dead near a duffel bag and about $2 million worth of cocaine that had been opened and scattered over a hillside. The parachutist, a former Kentucky narcotics investigator, had fallen to his death in a backyard in Knoxville, Tennessee. His unmanned airplane crashed into a North Carolina mountain. Back in Georgia, the bear, examiners said, had overdosed.
The story is in many ways too much. Too absurd. Too ’80s. Even the screenwriters of the “Fast & Furious” movies would think it farfetched. The strangerthan-fiction tale quickly receded from the headlines and, before some began to stoke the myth of “Pablo Escobear,” it mostly stayed buried in news media archives.
That changed when screenwriter Jimmy Warden delivered to producers Phil Lord and Christopher Miller a script titled “Cocaine Bear.” They were on board from page one.
“When the movie’s pitched, you hear the word ‘Cocaine,’ you’re like I’m not sure what to think of this,” Lord says. “Then when you hear the word ‘Bear,’ you’re like: I’m all in.”
Very loosely based on events
Yes, “Cocaine Bear” is a real movie. And it might even be a hit. Since the trailer debuted for Elizabeth Banks’ very, very loosely based-on-a-truestory R-rated comedy, it has stoked a rabid zeitgeist. At a time when much in Hollywood can feel prepackaged, the makers of “Cocaine Bear” think it can be an untamed exception.
“Hopefully, the film lives up to the title,” Banks says, smiling. “That was the goal.”
Little on the movie calendar has captured the public imagination quite like “Cocaine Bear.” Its trailer, watched more than 25 million times, immediately went viral.
“You have to demonstrate theatricality to get the green light. It just means you have to swing the bat a little harder,” Lord says.
Miller and Lord have in recent years shepherded some of the most vibrant and irreverent films to the screen, including “The Lego Movie,” “SpiderMan: Into the Spider-Verse” and “The Mitchells vs. the Machines.” They like to take apart old conventions and give them an absurdist, post-modern spin.
“Certainly, this movie was not mandated by a corporation,” Miller says, laughing.
“It’s a thing we somehow snuck through the system. That’s how we love to make all our movies, like: ‘I can’t believe they let us get away with this.’ ”
Marrying gore with comedy
Since her directorial debut in 2015’s “Pitch Perfect 2,” Banks has carved out a second career behind the camera.
She last helmed 2019’s “Charlie’s Angels.” With Universal’s backing and Lord and Miller producing, “Cocaine Bear” struck her as not just a viable, actually-happening project but one where she could marry a gory animal attack movie with comedy.
“Most people are surprised that it is a real thing, and very surprised that I’m the person that made it,” says Banks, laughing. “I just got a text from someone who was like, ‘I’ve been hearing about this movie and I had no idea you made it.’ ”
The film itself takes the basis of the real story and imagines what might have transpired if the bear didn’t quickly die but went on a coke-fueled rampage through a national forest, terrorizing park wardens, campers and drug dealers seeking the lost shipment. After an initial taste, the bear goes after more cocaine with all the zeal of Yogi pursuing a picnic basket.
Lord and Miller hope that there’s a rising realization in the film industry that movies that are audaciously original can pack theaters. Lord points to “Everything Everywhere All at Once” as recent proof.
“For the scale of that movie, it’s a huge hit,” he said. “What we’re after is demonstrating that these movies can be original and fun and surprising and they can be hits.”