Benny Safdie on making a hero’s journey out of Dwayne Johnson in ‘Smashing Machine’

By Canadian Press on October 3, 2025.

TORONTO — Benny Safdie understands why some people might want to see him take a swing at his older brother, Josh.

The New York filmmaker siblings were once seemingly inseparable as the directing duo behind the acclaimed “Uncut Gems” starring Adam Sandler, and “Good Time,” led by Robert Pattinson.

But when they abruptly – and he says amicably – ended their creative partnership a few years ago, the director sensed that at least a few outsiders assumed a rift between them. He said, some might’ve even wanted tensions to flare.

“That’s what people want to see,” Safdie said in a recent interview at the Toronto International Film Festival.

“It doesn’t mean that’s what’s happening. But it’s fun. I think it’s funny. He’s my brother.”

Both brothers head into the final months of the year with their first solo-directed films set to hit theatres. Each one is chasing its own awards glory. A rivalry is practically baked into the narrative.

Benny is first out of the gate on Friday with “The Smashing Machine,” a gritty amateur wrestling drama that earned him the Silver Lion for best director at the Venice Film Festival last month, just days before it screened at TIFF.

His brother’s “Marty Supreme,” a period piece about a ping-pong player starring Timothée Chalamet, skipped the film festival circuit. It arrives in cinemas on Christmas Day in the heat of awards season.

That’s given “The Smashing Machine” a runway to launch its star Dwayne Johnson into the Oscar conversation. The former WWE wrestler is being praised for abandoning his familiar cartoonish persona to play real-life mixed martial arts fighter Mark Kerr.

It’s a nuanced portrayal that’s all the more impressive because Johnson achieves it from under layers of prosthetics by Oscar-winning makeup artist Kazu Hiro, which make his celebrity face unrecognizable.

“The Smashing Machine” traces Kerr’s life from 1997 to 2000, a period when his success was gradually being eroded by an addiction to painkillers. His girlfriend Dawn, played by Johnson’s “Jungle Cruise” co-star Emily Blunt, is often by his side even as tensions between them flare.

Johnson had long kept Kerr’s story in his back pocket, hoping that one day he could embody the role of another wrestler fighting their demons. Safdie came into the picture about half a decade ago, he says, after watching a 2002 documentary about Kerr and finding himself captivated by his story.

“There was something about Mark that imprinted itself inside of me,” he said, noting he saved screen grabs of the documentary on his phone.

“I felt like I understood Mark. I don’t know why. I don’t have a similar life to him, but I feel like there was just something so vulnerable about him.”

Safdie said he was interested in exploring a hero’s journey without falling into the usual trappings of a hero’s narrative arc. Kerr doesn’t necessarily have the happy ending some would associate with a sports film, but his life isn’t one of tragedy either.

The director points to the book “Losers: Dispatches from the Other Side of the Scoreboard” as one point of inspiration. The essay collection, published by sports journalists Mary Pilon and Louisa Thomas, examines the experience of falling short.

“The losses are where the humanity is,” he said. “That’s where you can really understand who we are. But nobody wants to talk about it because it’s shameful.”

He said with “The Smashing Machine,” he wanted to place viewers amid the emotions a defeated fighter confronts during their long walk back to the locker room.

In Kerr’s story, he said, it’s hardly one to be ashamed of.

“The fact that he is alive after everything he’s been through, that’s heroic,” he said.

“If he can go through all that and be OK, then what does that say about us? Maybe that gives us a little bit of hope.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 3, 2025.

David Friend, The Canadian Press