Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson’s first big shot at movie stardom came in The Rundown (2003) — a jungle action-comedy from a studio that couldn’t decide what it wanted.

This week, Movie Memory Machine digs into the awkward birth of a blockbuster franchise that never was.

In The Rundown (2003), Dwayne Johnson stars as Beck, a bounty hunter sent to the Amazon to retrieve his boss’s son — only to run into rebels, a tyrannical gold mine operator, and more fruit-based slapstick than expected. Directed by Peter Berg and co-starring Seann William Scott, Rosario Dawson, and Christopher Walken, this Universal Pictures release was engineered as The Rock’s theatrical coronation. But despite a massive marketing push and a “passing the torch” cameo from Arnold Schwarzenegger, the film underperformed — derailed by studio hesitations, misaligned expectations, and a leading man caught between personas.

Directed by Peter Berg and released by Universal Pictures, The Rundown (2003) stars Dwayne Johnson, Seann William Scott, Rosario Dawson, and Christopher Walken.

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Tags: The Rundown, 2003, Peter Berg, Dwayne Johnson, Seann William Scott, Rosario Dawson, Christopher Walken, action comedy, forgotten movies, early 2000s cinema