It's hard to imagine a time before MMA took over the pay-per-view channels of every bar room and dorm in North America. But it wasn't that many years ago it was on the metaphorical ropes: targeted for extermination by U.S. Sen. John McCain and attacked as barbaric even while organizations like UFC and Pride competed for ever-dwindling air time.
Into those rings walked Mark Kerr, the six-foot-three-inch, 250-plus-pound "Smashing Machine" whose favourite pastime was exerting his indomitable will upon the men foolish enough to join him in the octagon.
That's not to suggest Kerr is a violent man. Instead, the dichotomy between his insatiable bloodlust for physical dominance on the mat and his doe-eyed, soft-shoe familiarity off it is a huge part of Benny Safdie's new, similarly titled The Smashing Machine. In fact, that may be the only point the Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson-led film has to make.
Sure, there is an actual story here; documenting an oddly selected
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