Give Him The Skittles!!!!
Bad Boys: Ride or Die is an action comedy starring Will Smith, Martin Lawrence, Joe Pantoliano and Rhea Seehorn. The story is a direct continuation after the events of the third film, where lifetime police detective partners Mike Lowrey and Marcus Burnett, go on an explosion-laden thrill ride across the plains of Miami to clear their police Captain’s name after he is framed for a major crime.
From the very first scene the pace of this movie constantly either has you grinning at the classic Bruckheimer-style action, or laughing and at times quite uncontrollably at that. Over the years I’ve become quite bored with the average Hollywood summer blockbuster action flick, but I didn’t find myself rolling my eyes at anything lame, cliche or repetitive during this film. On the contrary, I sat in a packed theater and found myself one with the audience cheering for our heroes as they battled their foes while loving the comedy.
Martin Lawrence deserves the highest praise of all performances here as the comedic relief truly falls on his shoulders throughout the story, and he delivers with most of these moments successfully.
There were also some fabulous scenes in this movie that were throwbacks to the first 3 films, which provided some wonderful continuity and reminded audiences of the magic that worked so very well therein. A prominent example here is the character of Reggie McDonald, played by Dennis Greene who (without spoilers) gets more screen time in this film than ever before with easily the funniest scene that had audiences cheering and applauding in unison as we gobbled down our popcorn. Just fantastic Summer Blockbuster action there.
Although I am still mad at Will Smith for the slap heard around the world, I do want to mention that he and Martin Lawrence’s on-screen chemistry is brilliant and the 2 work off each other so naturally, you can feel their real friendship shine through and, as with the previous films, serves as a base from which the script’s humor permeates.
Another notable mention is Rhea Seehorn, whom looks convincing in a cop uniform after seeing her as a lawyer in the exemplary Better Call Saul AMC series.
I also noticed how Bruckheimer and directors El Arbi and Fallah did not feature the song ’Bad Boy for Life’ by P Diddy from the 3rd film and instead went back to the original song ‘Bad Boys [Bad Boys what you gonna do?]’ by Inner Circle, most probably because of the hot water P Diddy now finds himself in and the studio understandably wanting to distance themselves from him.
In retrospect this movie was oodles better than I was expecting and deserves the high praise it will receive as it hits cinemas on June 7. Having said that, I do feel it’s time to retire the franchise entirely and hope they stop after this one.