‘Bad Boys: Ride or Die’ REVIEW: You get your money’s worth
‘Bad Boys: Ride or Die’ REVIEW: You get your money’s worth
Martin Lawrence and Will Smith as Marcus and Mike in Bad Boys: Ride or Die || Image courtesy of Columbia Pictures
People don’t go to a Bad Boys movie expecting high art; they expect high-octane action, ridiculous shenanigans, and, to top it all off, the magnetic chemistry between Will Smith and Martin Lawrence. Plot, be damned.
If you are a fan of the previous installments, or at least find pleasure in witnessing a cacophony of explosive gunfights and foul-mouthed wisecracks, then consider this latest installment worth watching. If not, maybe wait until it’s streaming in the comforts of your home, because Bad Boys: Ride or Die has no business in reinventing the wheel. It just wants you to have a good time in the movies.
Initially helmed by American cinema’s proud pyromaniac Michael Bay for its first two installments, this nearly twenty-year-old and recently reported billion-dollar franchise found new captains in Belgian filmmaking duo Adil & Bilall, starting on its third installment, Bad Boys for Life.
Martin Lawrence as Marcus looking at hot dogs in Bad Boys: Ride or Die || Still taken from the film’s official trailer, courtesy of Columbia Pictures
Upon watching all the Bad Boys movies, I noticed the stark differences between oldtimer Bay’s treatment and newcomers Adil & Bilali's. Bay’s films have the titular boys, Marcus (Martin Lawrence) and Mike (Will Smith), find glee in their vulgarity and violence, embodying a hateful and cruel spirit to anyone, and showing a total disregard and apathy to human life. They revel in the chaos.
They don’t like to play by any rules and moral code, and they always have something that they can jest about even in a room full of bullet-riddled corpses. We also have a scene in Bad Boys II where Smith and Lawrence’s characters harass the latter’s daughter’s date Reggie (Dennis Greene) that is so infamous, even the late Roger Ebert calls it ‘needlessly cruel.’
Meanwhile, Adil & Bilall dial down the callousness of the Bay films and interpose a much more overt familial melodrama in both Bad Boys for Life and Ride or Die. Although there are tryhard attempts to imitate the Bayhem, gone is the original films’ mean-spirited nature, replaced by a more tasteful playfulness. There is also a surprising element of tough love and sincerity present in the midst of all the action and banter, and that heart is not limited to the dynamic between our titular heroes. Compared to the first two Bad Boys where they’re basically two-man shows, these revivals are open to sharing the spotlight with the side characters and finding camaraderie with these folks, albeit with mixed results.
These minor tweaks make me think that Adil & Bilall are trying to right some of the wrongs in Bay's films, while also honoring what has come before. One can also assume that these minor tweaks in the game are because of the lead actors’ age. Smith and Lawrence were 34 and 37, respectively, when they starred in Bad Boys II (2003).
Now, they’re in their fifties in this most recent installment. Their characters may retain their usual demeanors, but they're noticeably toned down, less agile, as opposed to how absurdly irrational they acted in the early installments. These Bad Boys are older and a bit wiser; they definitely won’t keep coming for you forever, and these new films let their fans know that.
Dennis Greene as Reggie in Bad Boys: Ride or Die || Image taken from the film’s official trailer, courtesy of Columbia Pictures
And while it's fine to see all the heroes and their friends and family hug it out and have a barbecue after all the commotion, I can’t help but feel like Vin Diesel would pop out at any second and yell, “Family!” The franchise’s switch to a familial melodrama feels strikingly familiar with the late-game Fast and Furious movies to the point of being identical. Hell, even the opening scenes of both Adil & Bilall’s Bad Boys movies with both Marcus and Mike racing through the streets of Miami look and feel so similar it’s nearly indistinguishable at first.
As a result, Bad Boys: Ride or Die does not offer anything groundbreaking for this franchise, nor even make itself stand out as a great action movie. Sure, maybe it doesn't have to be a game-changer; it's okay to be just a decent and fun popcorn movie, and Bad Boys: Ride or Die is a decent and fun popcorn movie. Martin Lawrence and Will Smith are as hysterical as ever, with the former’s character adopting a cartoonishly fearless persona after a near-death experience that evoked some of the biggest laughs in the theater.
Dennis Greene, who played Reggie in Bad Boys II, returns and finally gets to prove himself in the film’s most kick-ass sequence that has audiences roaring with applause. It’s also not without some inspired moments where albino crocodiles get involved in the action, and Adil & Bilall utilize drones and specialized camera rigs to craft a couple of cool set-pieces here and there.
However, the duo’s inventiveness only comes in sporadic bursts. The story, like the films that came before, remain generic and nothing of note, and most of the supporting cast including the villains are forgettable, despite being given a few moments to shine. So sure, maybe this fourth Bad Boys movie doesn’t have to be a game-changer, but I hold onto the idea that the film could've been so much more if it didn't confine itself to the traditional formula.
Bad Boys: Ride or Die is now showing in cinemas.
