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Bad Boys II

Bad Boys II is certainly a fitting title. Returning to their 1995 roles as Miami narcotics detectives Mike Lowrey and Marcus Burnett, Will Smith and Martin Lawrence are noticeably more bad than they were in the original, and act a lot more like immature boys rather than grown men.

Bad Boys II is jammed-packed with car chases, a KKK rally, gun shootouts, corpses, sexual situations involving rats, homosexual conversations, porn, severed fingers and heads, bloody limbs, exploding houses and people, female nudity, and Lawrence in a ludicrous and pointless sequence in which he accidentally takes some Ecstasy. Most of these things are unnecessary, unfunny, and seem to be present only for shock factor.

The main plot involves a drug lord using corpses and coffins to smuggle drugs and money to his mansion in Cuba. Mike and Marcus become more personally involved when they discover that Marcus' sister (Gabrielle Union) is working undercover to crack the case. Marcus freaks 'cuz yo, that's his lil' sis, and Mike-- well, one time when he was in New York he ran into her on the street, they went out for some dinner, hooked up and BAM are now a couple (the way the two tell the story is almost as ridiculous--trust me). How convenient, because this provides friction between our "Bad Boys", which leads to Marcus asking for a transfer and Mike recycling the trite phase, "We ride together, we die together: Bad Boys for life." Several attempts to sing the theme to COPS (i.e. "Bad Boys") is over done and played out, and simply reminds the audience of the more genuine, fun moments from the original--none of which are present here. Even Joe Pantoliano, returning as their stern police captain, seems thrown into the plot for appearance sake alone.

Smith and Lawrence work too hard to make their boyish squabbling seem convincing, and they never really succeed. Smith is a good actor with undeniable charm and charisma--he owns the screen. Lawrence's performance is forced, his comic attempts miss, and the chemistry between he and Smith seems to have disappeared. In probably the only semi-humorous scene, the duo confront a boy who has come to pick up Marcus' now 15-year-old daughter for a date (wasn't she a toddler in the original?). They are harsh, cruel and over the top, but I still managed to crack a smile...maybe in slight disbelief. Too bad they couldn't have had this banter with someone other than a child, because it was completely inappropriate, random, and embarrassing.

Producer Jerry Bruckheimer and director Michael Bay have made a grotesque, violent, testosterone-heavy summer film, and abandon the fun, buddy-cop comedy and decently paced action of the original in favor of explosion-after-explosion, car chase-after-car chase, plus a double dose of bad humor. It has few truly fun moments--however the freeway chase gives another chase from earlier this summer, a run for its money, but the over-acted quips the two fire at each other leave something to be desired. Painfully long, as many films have been this summer, the length could have easily been cut down. The 30 minute-plus ending exists simply to blow up a house, some cars and ultimately a few people. I would have preferred not to see that, but why not I suppose, given the contents of the rest of the movie. It was definitely already a strong R-rating--one of the first in a long time in which theater employees checked IDs before allowing entry to the actual auditorium the movie was showing in.

Extreme and completely tasteless in its effort, Bad Boys II ironically left a "bad" taste in my mouth.

Written by: Laurie Kisner

Reviewers Rating: 6
Reader's Rating: 7.89
Reader's Votes: 34

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