It’s not easy to get a big laugh before a film’s opening credits even complete their roll, but Dan Berk and Robert Olsen’s “Novocaine” manages to pull that trick off without a hitch. Yes, those first laughs — built on the inspired choice to open a film about a guy who can’t feel any pain with R.E.M.’s “Everybody Hurts” — rely on an audience knowing the action outing’s biggest and best idea before they’ve even taken the first sip of their multiplex soda, but there’s much more going on. Well, at first.

Nathan Caine can’t feel any pain, a kicky enough idea for both a film and a tagline, and it’s understandably made his life as downbeat as, well, one of R.E.M.’s biggest hits. When we meet Nathan, we’re treated not just to the dulcet tones of Michael Stipe,...