The Rock was incredibly dedicated to ensuring that the Smashing Machine would do justice to Mark Kerrs career in the UFC. However, that didnt always give the best results as the Rock ended up suffering a concussion while filming the movie.
While speaking to Jimmy Fallon, The Rock explained that while filming The Smashing Machine, director Benny Safdie insisted on making everything look as real as possible, even avoiding stunt doubles.
For The Rock, that meant taking real hits in fight scenes. To prepare, he put on 30 pounds of muscle and went through a three-month training camp with MMA fighters and coaches to fully embody Mark Kerr.
One major scene recreated Kerrs real fight in Japan against Kazuyuki Fujita, where Kerr was on all fours taking strikes in front of 30,000 fans. Safdie wanted the film to capture that exact moment without faking it. The Rock told his opponent in the scene to hit him for real but the fighter refused at first. Eventually, Safdie convinced him to go through with it for authenticity.
So the Rock took repeated shots during filming and ended up with a legitimate concussion. Despite the risk he believed it was necessary, saying that if youre going to make an MMA movie, you have to commit fully and play the part all the way.
The Rocks dedication did pay off as the movie received a lot of critical acclaim ahead of its release on October 3. Nonetheless, the Rock showed how serious he was about making the movie real by pushing himself to honor Mark Kerrs MMA career. He chose realism over comfort, giving one of the most honest performances of his career, even though it came at a physical cost.
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