The signs do not look especially good for Black Adam. A film that arrives after such a miserable run of DC movies that DC itself has stopped bothering to tell people about it, offering only shoddy marketing and bad prerelease word of mouth.
But you’d be a fool to write it off, because Black Adam stars Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson. And Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson is a born salesman. The man would do anything to make the film a success. Even, it appears, snatching a crowdsurfing baby from the arms of a stranger and cradling it for all the world to see.
Last week, during a Black Adam press event in Mexico, one spectator appeared to fully lose his mind in the presence of The Rock, handing his newborn daughter through the crowd until she was eventually passed into Johnson’s arms. In the video posted to Johnson’s Instagram account, you can trace the entire universe of emotions that pass across his face as he realises what is happening. There is gratitude at being handed a gift, then there’s stifled horror as he realises that the gift is a real live baby. And finally, there is showmanship. Johnson holds that baby as if she were his favourite championship wrestling belt.
“People do cry and they hand me things – I was NOT surprised to be handed this beautiful little baby ”, Johnson wrote on Instagram. “Her father caught my attention because he had tears in his eyes when he held her up high and gestured for me to hold her. I honestly thought he was holding a toy doll he wanted me to have as a gift”.
It is fair to say that reaction to this has been mixed. The true Rock believers have flooded Instagram with a flurry of heart emojis. GQ decided to focus on the watch that The Rock was wearing when it happened. Others, meanwhile, have tended to question the parenting ability of anyone willing to pass their baby across a sea of strangers’ hands just for a photo with the guy from Ballers.
I am in the latter group, not least because babies are not impressed by anything like this. When my eldest son was born, I made the mistake of taking him to a Teletubbies premiere, which culminated with a photo opportunity with the Teletubbies themselves. Needless to say he was tremendously nonplussed; falling asleep just beforehand, so in the resulting picture it looks as if I am offering him up to Dipsy as a kind of nightmarish blood sacrifice.
And these were the Teletubbies for crying out loud. They were specifically designed to appeal to preschool children. Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson was not specifically designed to appeal to preschool children. He was specifically designed for men in their mid-40s who, in a flood of post-divorce torment, have started getting really into the Joe Rogan podcast.
Still, though, it’s hard to see this as anything other than an almighty flex by Johnson. It is a gauntlet thrown down to all the other movie stars of the world. This little Mexican baby is a trophy now. What’s the craziest thing that Tom Hanks gets handed at events like these? At this stage in his career, probably just archaic typewriter paraphernalia. Try to imagine Tom Cruise, George Clooney or Ben Affleck taking custody of a newborn baby on a red carpet. Imagine the terror and confusion they would display.
Not Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, though. He was unfazed and unruffled, taking hold of that baby like a goddamn presidential candidate. And, if enough people go and see Black Adam in cinemas, he’ll probably give her back one day.
