So what’s the next-best thing to Wolverine – a guy who feels pain, but heals instantly? How about a guy who doesn’t heal instantly, but feels no pain? Anti-Wolverine here has quite the “skill set,” which is to say he suffers from a rare genetic disorder that allows for short lives and entertaining films.
Nate (Jack Quaid) suffers from congenital insensitivity to pain with anhidrosis (CIPA). This is a real thing, apparently. Wiki sez: “Approximately 20% of people with CIPA die of hyperthermia by age 3.” The film sez the average life span of a CIPA person stops shy of 30. I guess we should be happy for Nate; Jack Quaid is already 32. As one might expect, Nate is cautious and introverted. As much as pain sucks, it is a necessary evil: it warns, it describes, it cautions, it demands. Without the ability to feel pain, the best one can hope for is a cool party trick and at worst it’s an early grave. Living a life without physical pain may seem ideal, but pain is an alarm bell. Only an idiot voluntarily lives without a smoke alarm.
As an unattached man and an assistant bank manager, Nate doesn’t have much call for excitement in his life, which is probably how he’s made it to 30 without major issue. Well, that and he never eats solid food for obvious reason. Enter Sherry (Amber Midthunder), a new teller who is smitten with our exceptionally plain hero? Why? I must be watching a movie. Over drinks, Nate confesses his condition, which seems to intrigue her … well, it would intrigue anybody, I imagine, but that wouldn’t make me go to bed with him.
And the very next day, Nate’s bank is robbed; the manager and several police officers are shot, and Sherry is taken hostage. Well, gosh, what’s a new lover with access to a police car supposed to do? Sit idly by? I think not! And this is where the story gets good, for Nate is no hero, not in any traditional sense at least, and he has zero combat or weapon experience. However, if all you care about is retrieving the girl from armed violent robbers, having an inability to feel pain can come in handy – at least for a limited time.
This lends itself to scenes like the one where Nate breaks into the house of a paranoid 
conspiracy theorist and triggers literally every otherwise crippling trap in the house … which leads to a torture scene where Nate Caine (“Novocaine”) has to fake it like a hooker with a sugardaddy client. This film will not appeal to everyone, clearly, but you can’t fault it for lack of invention.
Novocaine can be brutal and disgusting. Well, what did you expect? I mean, if the gimmick is he’s immune to pain, you’re gonna see A LOT of very painful things, right? Some of them will be bloody, some gross, some both. Perhaps the early part of the film didn’t spell that out -and it could have- but that is exactly what you’ll get again and again and again in Acts II and III. I like the gimmick; I like the character; and while I can certainly wait for Novocaine II, I readily expect it to happen, and such will not be a disappointment.
There was once a shy milquetoast named Nate
Who couldn’t feel pain, ain’t it great?
And then he got a “friend”
Upon whom he did depend
Seems this calls for an intervention of fate
Rated R, 110 Minutes
Director: Dan Berk, Robert Olsen
Writer: Lars Jacobson
Genre: The fun side of genetic disorders
Type of being most likely to enjoy this film: Dork sympathizers
Type of being least likely to enjoy this film: Bullies
