Lethal Weapon 4
So now things come full circle for The Lethal Franchise. From being a dark, moody hardcore action movie in Part 1 all the way to Part 4, an unashamed, unabashed, goofball action comedy with a touch of a sitcom feel to it with the mostly comedic interactions amongst its various regulars, topped off by a guest lead villain who for the most part is deadly serious. One can see just why they got this far, as Mel Gibson was paid $30 million up front (plus points), Danny Glover pocketed a cool $15 million (easily the highest payday that his career will ever see), Joe Pesci nailed $5 million for three weeks work to reprise his Leo Getz role (and promptly retired shortly thereafter) while Rene Russo received $2.5 million for a vastly reduced role from the previous film and newcomer to the âfamilyâ Chris Rock only got $1 million. And with that, the sense of fun and cast chemistry that the series has come to embody now comes out to the fore fully. The film begins with a scene straight out of a comic book movie as Riggs and Murtaugh answer a call to confront a random maniac (who is never identified) walking around with a flamethrower and an automatic weapon laying waste to everything in sight and because he is so heavily armored up, bullets have no effect on him whatsoever. During the melee, Murtaugh reveals to Riggs that his girlfriend Lorna (Russo) is pregnant, but she doesnât want Riggs to know yet because sheâs afraid that heâll get mad. Riggs counters with an even bigger revelation in stating that Murtaughâs daughter Rianne (Traci Wolfe, so hot and cute in these films that one wonders why she had virtually no acting career outside the franchise) is ALSO pregnant, albeit with a child from a person whom she refuses to name fearing her fatherâs wrath. That gives the duo the motivation to wipe out the anonymous weirdo with the flamethrower and move on to better things like a fishing trip with them and Pesciâs Getz (continuing to do his sputtering comedic rants with a healthy dose of foul language) who is now working as a private detective. Suddenly a large ship nearly runs them over, an impromptu shootout takes place and (after Murtaughâs boat is sunk) it turns out that the ship is carrying a bunch of Chinese immigrants who are illegally being smuggled into the country to work as slave labor (a real life problem that is almost always overlooked in favor of the Mexican border issue). Upon further investigation, Riggs and Murtaugh (who have just both been promoted to captain solely to keep them off the streets and help keep insurance costs down due to all the wreckage that they leave in their wake) discover that the immigrant trafficking is the work of The Triads (Chinese organized crime). As stated, the basic formula for the series has come to be that of an action / comedy / sitcom with a deadly serious villain and after the successful turn by Gary Busey as the wild eyed mercenary heroin trafficker Mr. Joshua in Part 1, we then got saddled with Part 2âs stiff as a board South African villains in Joss Ackland and Derrick OâConnor and Part 3âs amazingly bland and boring ex cop turned gun runner Jack Travis as played by Stuart Wilson. But here the series comes full circle in more ways than one by bringing in Jet Li as the main Triad running the human trafficking operation, not only very handily taking the cake as the seriesâ best villain since Busey, but also being portrayed as an incredibly ruthless figure, thinking nothing of killing his own men with his bare hands when they make mistakes not to mention those who either get in his way or who have outlived their usefulfulness to him. And his martial arts skills are truly spectacular here (leading to a long career in Hollywood afterwards). Comparatively, Rock (playing the secret husband and father of Rianne and her baby whom everyone including Riggs knows about) is ridiculously miscast playing a cop here, getting some funny lines throughout but looking completely unqualified to be joining in on the action (with a totally serious and unfunny bit showing him ranting over an innocent murder victim being borderline painful) and his tendency to kiss up to Murtaugh every chance he gets (leading the unknowing Murtaugh to suspect him of being gay which in the original script he actually was) is nearly devoid of any potential comic value (we almost wonder how Rianne who once harbored such a massive crush on Riggs could wind up with such a walking turd by comparison). But the most notable thing about Rockâs character and the one that continues to have the most lasting value is in the characterâs name (Butters) which was later used as the intentional character name for the kid on South Park who started off as being the miserable fifth wheel of the main core group of characters but who later on managed to develop quite a following for himself (unlike the Chris Rock character of the same name who got a horrible reaction from most fans). Russo on the other hand (upon getting stuck with the âpregnantâ label from the writers) doesnât get to do any of her fantastic fight scenes like she did in Part 3 beating up on various wayward henchmen and only seems to be in the movie when needed to act bitchy and pregnant (with a couple of moments where she gets placed in peril in order to keep the tension factor high) while Pesci gets his screen time increased from Part 3, engaging in an hilarious exchange of insults with Rock in one scene and getting various other bits thrown in there too. But returning director Richard Donner (who still insists that a Lethal 5 might still get made with the original cast even while the awful TV show that was forced to kill off their version of Riggs because of the nobody actorâs onset behavior is still on the air) smartly remembers that the focus of this series is, was and always will be on Riggs and Murtaugh while everything else is merely window dressing in the form of other actors. And here Gibsonâs Riggs (with his now short hair) is also forced to ponder the inevitability of old age, something which Murtaugh tries to counsel him on but which truly becomes apparent when we see this ex Special Forces badass actually going down in hand to hand combat against the much younger and fiercer Jet Li (before being saved), something which has probably never happened before. It turns out that Liâs master plan is to gain custody of the imprisoned âFour Fathersâ of The Triad (one of whom is his older brother), shipping them over from China to presumably release them onto American soil in order to have them take over all organized crime operations in The United States, but that plan is easier said than done considering that Li (keeping in mind that his was a role first offered to Jackie Chan who turned it down due to his no villains policy) is also doing business with a shady Chinatown crime boss (Kim Chan) whom the LAPD have always known to be involved in illegal activities and thus have underneath a constant watch, but the cold smirking way in which he stands overhead and watches Riggs and Murtaugh do battle with his henchmen, only jumping into the fray when the last of his own guys have dropped, not to mention quickly dismantling Riggsâ gun in one quick move in order to render him nearly helpless are but merely a couple of examples of the caliber of bad guy that weâre dealing with here (reportedly Donner even had to ask him to slow his moves down because the camera wasnât picking up all of it due to his quickness), and while many have said that human trafficking and the smuggling of crime bosses into this country are not exactly the most compelling of bad guy master plans, it is Li himself and his presence, sense of danger and willingness to kill anybody in a quick yet still painful way that makes the threat here all the more immediate than it ever was in the past (thus proving that the villianâs performance is more important than the villainâs plan). And with Riggs unable to put him down by himself, it just stands to reason that Murtaugh would now stand side to side with him for a good old fashioned two on one effort. The film would seem to play itself out as being the final one in the series and thatâs a good thing because this neutered version of Riggs finally got to be in a powerful yet entertaining story, albeit one that Shane Black (who would have killed off Riggs at the end of Part 2 if he had had his way) would see as being the polar opposite of his original vision as the âhigh end TV cop show as movie franchiseâ comes to an end here on a high note and in a much better way than Blackâs actual TV show version could ever have managedâŚ
8/10