I mentioned when talking about Judge Dredd that it felt like a throwback to the movies of the 1980s. The first Bad Boys came out the same year, and it seems like a far newer film. Will Smith when he was cool and Martin Lawrence chew up the scenery as two detectives hunting for heroin stolen from the police evidence room. A witness to a shootout (Téa Leoni) has been told to only trust Will Smith’s Lowery, a ladies man, but when she calls looking for help, she gets family man Burnett (Lawrence) who pretends to be Lowery. Which leads to some comedy as the detectives have to pretend to be each other to keep the ruse going. A couple of chases, gunfights, and explosions later, and finis.
C’mon, man, you’re not here for insight into the human condition. You’re here to see Smith and Lawrence chew the scenery and banter. Apparently, it works, since there have been two widely spaced sequels (2003 and 2020(!)). So an amusing couple of hours and a way for me to bring my pop culture knowledge all the way up to 1995.
And this might be the first film where Téa Leoni’s character did not annoy me. The list of those films includes Deep Impact, The Family Man, and Spanglish. I guess I did not specifically mention being annoyed with her in Fun with Dick and Jane, so maybe not.
