Warner Brothers have been having a bad time. With films like Contact (Which I enjoyed) and Batman & Robin, there films having been doing very poorly. To make matters worse, their big project, the revival of Superman, was shelved. This meant that apart from ’The Avengers’, they had no other summer blockbuster that year.
So in January, the big bosses gave to green light to Lethal Weapon 4 in the hope that their successful franchise would pull in the business they need. it was to be the quickest movie shoot in history. Principal photography started at the end of January and the final film was released in the US on the 31st of July. What were the results...
I have never been a big fan of the Lethal Weapon series, and this simple cash in didn’t do anything to change my mind. They story consists of three simple mini stories. The main bulk of the story is to do with the Chinese triads trying to bring into the country four Mafia style bosses. The next is the fact that Murtaugh (played by Danny Glover) doesn’t realise that the new cop he hates is in fact his son-in-law, and can Riggs (played by Mel Gibson)finally bring himself to get married to Lorna (played by Rene Russo). This film also Co-stars with Joe Pesci, Chris Tucker and Jet Li.
There is a lot of comedy to this film and to be honest I found it more entertaining than the action sequences. Some of the best parts came with Joe Pesci talking to Chris Tucker. This combination really worked and they have some good scenes together.
Glover and Gibson ran through the same routine as usual which have made the films so popular and even Riggs admits to, ’’being too old for this s**t!’’ Everyone else in the film seemed to be there just to make sure that ’the gangs all here’. Trying real hard to make it feel like another Lethal Weapon film.
The action sequences were decidedly average. The film started well with Riggs and Murtaugh stopping an armoured guy who’s brandishing a flame thrower and machine gun. Of course things go wrong and an entire petrol station goes up in flames. But after that, everything else had that feel that you seen it all before. What came as a big surprise to me that the end came so quick. The last battle is a very poor sub standard shoot out in a warehouse. At this point I was thinking that this was just another little battle to keep the film moving along and there will be a big final battle at the end, Not so. After the warehouse, Riggs and Murtaugh beat the bad guy and the movies over with a super happy ending.
Perhaps, as with the Alien franchise, this is a film that shouldn’t have been made. The first three make a respectable trilogy, but this just weakens the that bond. Its a very watchable film, with some good comedy and poor action, but only 3 out of 5 from me though some of you may disagree.