Having gone by the name ‘Franchise Viagra’ in the past, Dwayne Johnson is a man who knows a thing or two about either creating a brand-new film series or turning an existing one into a bigger success. Sadly, he was at the beginning of his career when what’s arguably the single most underrated effort in his entire filmography arrived.
In fact, it’s been so long since The Rundown came to theaters in September 2003 that he was billed as The Rock in both the marketing and the credits, and there were probably a lot of people out there who didn’t have a clue what his actual name was.
The rainforest buddy caper sees Johnson’s retrieval expert Beck hired by a deliciously hammy Christopher Walken to track down his wayward son, played by Seann William Scott. However, Rosario Dawson’s rebel leader ends up drawing the mismatched duo on a hunt for hidden treasure, all while they try and evade the bad guys while attempting not to double-cross each other at every turn.
Unfortunately, The Rundown flopped hard at the box office after barely recouping the $80 million budget, despite winning praise from critics and the audiences that actually went to see it. Director Peter Berg has teased a sequel every now and again, but fans will have to make do with revisiting the movie on Netflix, which they’ve clearly been doing after it crashed right into Netflix’s Top 20, as per FlixPatrol.