BEFORE: WE DID IT! We made it to Big Movie #5,000! And it only took - well, 16 years and few months. It's been 5,952 days since I started doing this, to be precise. Wow, I took 952 days off? That almost seems weirder than watching 5,000 movies. 17 years is a LONG time, sure, but I have no plans to stop. It's bittersweet because I just got out of a long-term job that I worked for 31 years, which seems even longer, hell, that's more than half my life. 17 years is less than a third of my life but still, I feel very old. And tired. Let me celebrate tonight with some beers and cupcakes and sleep in tomorrow, that's all I ask.
Jason Davis carries over from "Runaway Jury", and any time that a name is that common I have to double-check to make sure it's the RIGHT Jason Davis, there are tons of them listed in the IMDB - this Jason Davis is indicated by a roman numeral for 8 in the IMDB, so I'm sure it's the same one in both films. Sadly, I missed Martin Lawrence's birthday by two days, so no SHOUT-out to him, sorry. But with this film tonight I'm perfectly set up for my Easter film in just two days, so I'm right on track.
THE PLOT: When their late police captain gets linked to drug cartels, wisecracking Miami cops Mike Lowrey and Marcus Burnett embark on a dangerous mission to clear his name.
AFTER: Sure, I might have preferred "Gladiator II" or something maybe a bit more meaningful to land on the big number, but it's fine. It's a big Hollywood blockbuster, it's relatively current - not new, but OK, a year old, that's fine. Really, what could measure up to such a big milestone and not leave me wondering if there was a better way to program the chain? Almost every chain of movies I devise, I end up wondering if there could have been a better way. It doesn't matter, as long as I get to the next holiday or milestone, it's fine. I've got Easter and Mother's Day in the bag, and this is also the 100th film this year, so this Movie Year is already 1/3 over, and in a way, it feels like it just started! It's fine, really.
The fourth film in the "Bad Boys" franchise has Mike dealing with his adult son, seen in the last film, and trying to be a good dad to someone who's in prison for being a drug cartel terrorist or something. Who can remember? Mike also gets married at the start of this film, because if he doesn't, who are the bad guys going to hold hostage, later in the movie? Meanwhile Marcus has a heart attack or something at Mike's wedding, which leads him to have visions of an afterlife where he sees their old captain, and also flashes of the many lives he's had over the centuries - so we're going deep on reincarnation on this one. But as a result Marcus also believes that he cannot die, that he's got some mystic purpose in life, and also he learns that he needs to cut back on snacks. It's possible that belief in reincarnation is tied to eating too much refined sugar, I guess. Eat too many Skittles and you, too, will believe that you've lived and died many times?
Yeah, this installment maybe takes these two characters in some very weird directions, but what else should they do, keep telling the same story, over and over again? Hell, Captain Howard died in the last film, but he ends up getting a lot of screen time here, via flashbacks, dreams and video messages he recorded on his computer which get sent out to Mike and Marcus at crucial moments, and reveal important plot points as needed. Well, he's certainly very helpful from beyond the grave! It's almost like he never died at all... The whole point of this film is to clear Captain Howard's name, after evidence comes to light that he was working with the drug cartels over the years - and this casts a shadow on Mike and Marcus, who were under his command for a long time.
If only they had access to someone who worked for the drug cartels, who could confirm the new information - why, they do! Mike's son Armando worked for the cartels for years, the problem is that nobody believes him because he's also an assassin and Captain Howard's killer. But Mike and Marcus trust him, and they believe he could identify the true criminal mastermind behind everything, if only they could find a picture of him. Well, they can't, not without knowing his name, because that's how Google works, so they're kind of stuck, until the mastermind attacks during the helicopter ride bringing Armando to Miami, disabling the aircraft and then escaping via parachute. Mike, Marcus and Armando survive the helicopter crash but then disappear for their own safety, leaving the Miami PD and federal agents to assume they're all criminals on the run, working together. By coincidence, Capt. Howard's daughter is a U.S. Marshal assigned to track them down.
They get back to Miami in time to figure out the identity of the criminal conspirators, just before assassins strike at their families and homes. Marcus's son-in-law is a Marine that protects his family, but Mike's wife and Capt. Howard's granddaughter get kidnapped and taken to the most ridiculous crime cartel hide-out ever, but I suppose such a place is easily found in Florida, the location of most of the world's ridiculous theme parks. The last third of the film is the big, giant, action-packed assault on a hide-out that honestly, Big Movie 5,000 really deserved. The good guys prevail and most of the bad guys die, and really, isn't that all we can really ask for? Plus there are so many cool acronyms, with the FBI, the DEA and AMMO (Advanced Miami Metro Operations) all coming together!
Directed by Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah (directors of "Bad Boys for Life")
Also starring Will Smith (last seen in "Albert Brooks: Defending My Life"), Martin Lawrence (last seen in "Death at a Funeral" (2010)), Vanessa Hudgens (last seen in "Second Act"), Alexander Ludwig (last seen in "Midway"), Paola Nuñez (last seen in "Bad Boys for Life"), Eric Dane (last seen in "Burlesque"), Ioan Gruffudd (last seen in "Ava"), Jacob Scipio (last seen in "The Expend4bles"), Levy Tran (ditto), Melanie Liburd, Tasha Smith (last seen in "Dolemite Is My Name"), Rhea Seehorn, Tiffany Haddish (also last seen in "Albert Brooks: Defending My Life"), Joe Pantoliano (last seen in "Just Getting Started"), John Salley (last seen in "Bad Boys II"), DJ Khaled (last heard in "Spies in Disguise"), Bianca Bethune (also last seen in "Bad Boys for Life"), Dennis Greene (ditto), Jasmin Lawrence (ditto), Michael Bay (ditto), Quinn Hemphill, Derek Russo (last seen in "Shazam! Fury of the Gods"), Karter Reese Newsome, Jay DeVon Johnson (last seen in "Den of Thieves"), Jeff J.J. Authors (last seen in "Angel Eyes"), Nicholas Verdi, Steven Sean Garland, Jerri Tubbs (last seen in "Where the Crawdads Sing"), Jewelianna Ramos Ortiz (last seen in "Jackpot!"), Enoch King (last seen in "Till"), James Lee Thomas, Jay Shetty, Ahmed Lucan (last seen in "The Leisure Seeker"), Bria Brimmer (last seen in "Hillbilly Elegy"), Alex Joseph Pires, Nathan Hesse (last seen in "Brothers"), Jesse Malinowski, Blanca Goodfriend, Adriana Sheri, Joyner Lucas, Marybel Rodriguez, Austin Carter, Dwight Turner, Jenna Kanell (last seen in "The Front Runner"), Rob Mars, Bobby Hernandez (last seen in "Creed III"), Jacob Lee Bereson, Khaby Lame
RATING: 7 out of 10 hot dogs on the convenience store roller grill
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