Director: Michael Bay

Cast: Martin Lawrence, Will Smith, Tea Leoni, Tcheky Karyo, Theresa Randle, Joe Pantoliano

Screenplay: Michael Barrie, Jim Mulholland, Doug Richardson

118 mins. Rated R for intense violent action and pervasive strong language.

 

I just watched Bad Boys for the second time. The first viewing I had was sometime after the sequel, Bad Boys II, was released. I was upset I hadn’t seen the original film and therefore could not witness the explosive spectacle of a film, so I changed that. I watched it. I somehow remember the film being…how do I put it, less terrible?

Bad Boys is a buddy cop film about partners Marcus Burnett (Martin Lawrence, TV’s Partners, Big Momma’s House) and Mike Lowry (Will Smith, Men in Black, Focus). Burnett is a married man with a couple kids who dreams of less complicated days. Lowry is a newly rich single man who likes to get down and dirty with the ladies. When one of Lowry’s special ones is shot down in a hail of gunfire, her friend Julie (Tea Leoni, TV’s Madam Secretary, Deep Impact) goes to Lowry for help. She ends up believing that Burnett is Lowry and seeking out protection from him. As the two cops play some stupid version of Trading Places, there is also a bad guy doing…something. This is Bad Boys.

Bad Boys is the feature film debut of director Michael Bay (Transformers, Pain & Gain), and it also gives some of his less-awful work, though he still valued explosions over character development (what develops a character more than almost dying constantly, right?).

The two leads have enough chemistry to really build a franchise akin to Lethal Weapon and Beverly Hills Cop, but the script merely bastardizes the two series by ripping them off too much instead of forging a new path for itself, and the mistaken identity Freaky Friday conceit that envelops the film falls flat almost instantly and is drug along for the entire film’s runtime instead of abandoned early on like it should have been.

The villain Fouchet (Tcheky Karyo, TV’s The Missing, The Patriot) is a cardboard cutout with little memorable features. I just watched it and I can’t even really recall his purpose. He is neither fleshed out enough to feel real of sinister enough to be terrifying.

Michael Bay’s Bad Boys is a bad film. I feel like Lawrence and Smith could play with their buddy cop relationship well if only the script was serviceable enough to give them room to play. For the most part, their talent is completely wasted and overshadowed by the “Things Blowing Up” route Bay’s directing takes them.

 

1.5/5

-Kyle A. Goethe

 

For my review of Michael Bay’s Transformers, click here.

For my review of Michael Bay’s Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, click here.

For my review of Michael Bay’s Transformers: Dark of the Moon, click here.

For my review of Michael Bay’s Transformers: Age of Extinction, click here.