Rev. Peggy Bryan

And the Winner Is…..

2021 Academy Award Best Picture

The deed is done, all Best Picture 2021 nominees are checked off. Let me offer that my first impression of the pandemic lot lands somewhere between depressing and disappointing. Period piece docudramas Judas and the Black Messiah and Trial of the Chicago Seven overlaid on today’s Black Lives Matter reinforces that nothing has changed, nothing. Yes, that’s a legitimate message and “dismal” isn’t justification for criticizing—but both films struck me as barely a cut above made-for-tv fare and that is legitimate criticism. Of course, in the Covid era, Hollywood releases by necessity detoured to homebound small screens. I’m definitely grateful for quarantine entertainment but maybe the 2021 Oscar winners need a Roger Maris asterisk. When Hearst Castle giraffes, stately and stunning, steal the Mank liver-dissolving drinking show, a cinematography award is probably a better category than Best Picture. Of course, Hollywood adores Hollywood, so sleazy Mank and glamorous giraffes could stage a sweep. The Father is crazy-making creative, confusing, and complicated, disorienting and distressing. While I’ll never be accused of pining for Pollyanna cinema, harsh reality crossing into psyche brutality is not my idea of celluloid art and The Father left me for dead. Minari enlightened me about chick sexing. Who knew? Minari’s characters were winners, biblical allegory interesting but the storyline pedestrian. Sorry, Parasite spoiled me. Revenge incinerated redemption in Promising Young Woman. Wrath and reprisal draws cheers in Superhero flicks or fires up Nicolas Cage fans but should draw a big no from the Academy. Please. So now I’m down to my two favorites, Nomadland and Sound of Metal. Nomadland invited us to tag along with an intriguing, restless American Bedouin subculture. Sound of Metal did the same for the world of the deaf. Nomadland inched a bit too close to romanticizing the challenges that mercilessly stalk vandwellers, stealth campers and seasonal migrant “workampers.” Happy Trails banners occasionally fly over a tattered RV community circled up for free on public lands but the rest of the story is just as often tinged with misfortune and adversity. That said, I adore Frances McDormand and I’ll follow her anywhere, dreamily lurching along in a vintage VW camper trying to keep up. Sound of Metal truly elevated the deaf into plain sight and we literally were handed a different drummer. This film worked for me. Realty, reconciliation and redemption all there. Sound of Metal, a certain sleeper, gets my vote for 2021 Best Picture. See you Sunday! I’ll bring the popcorn!

See You Later Alligator!

Crawl – 2019 – R

If you like watching the animal kingdom chomp, crunch and swallow a swath of humans, Jaws and Crawl would make an epic double feature! If you are a diehard shark attack fan, summer audiences have been enthralled by The Shallows in 2016, 47 Meters Down in 2017, The Meg in 2018 and in 2020, sadly a reality tragedy unfolded as a 26 year old surfer lost his leg and life to a great white off the beach in Santa Cruz County at an area known as “Shark Park.” Rest In Peace. Sharks, I contest, have filled more than their fair share of screen time. 2019 belongs to gluttonous gators. Trust me, Crawl will more than satisfy your craving for carnage.

The plot, if you insist, is Dave (Barry Pepper) goes missing, sending his University of Florida competitive swimmer and estranged daughter Haley (Kaya Scodelario) hunting for him as a Category 5 hurricane begins pounding the Everglades. Following a trail of empty booze bottles, Haley finds dad injured in the crawl space under their family home. Incapacitated dad and determined daughter both are trapped as spiders, rats, sewage, unidentifiable rotting things and rising sea waters play second fiddle to two hungry, hungry, 15-foot alligators playing Hide, Seek & Eat with Haley and Dave.

Yes, there are ridiculous and absurd interludes. When seconds stand between you and being eaten alive, do you really check messages on the cell phone you just risked your life to recover from the muck? The answer is, if you are a 21st century college student, yes, by all means do stop and post to Instagram! Don’t mind us, we will hold our breath while a massive gator closes in. (Kidding, she was calling 9-1-1 but with the all the urgency given to a social media post). Speaking of holding your breath, Haley and a breath holding record in Ripley’s Believe It or Not are a done deal. For one ready-set-SWIM “Gator vs Haley” race to the drain hole, she forfeited breathing long enough for me to complete a kitchen popcorn and beverage run.

Even with the inexplicable and the absurd, Crawl was bursting with enough decent and indecent jump scares to qualify as a perfect quarantine movie night selection. At 87 minutes in length, it roars along at a gator kill ratio of one human per every 17.5 minutes so there’s more gristle and gore than actual casualties, a nod to those of you who cringe at high body counts. The big question, does Crawl’s loyal and loving Sugar the scruffy dog suffer the same fate as poor Pipet, the genial black lab in Jaws? No spoilers from me. Watch until the inevitable cut-to-black ending, the sure sign of an indie B movie for which Crawl definitely qualifies—but, it’s a fun watch, worth your time. Unfortunately, Crawl can only be watched on Amazon Prime’s relatively new EPIX channel. We signed up for the 7-day free trial just to see Crawl and afterwards got hooked on EPIX’s original series Belgravia so we may be in the hole for $5.99/month until we complete our binge. In the meantime, enjoy some gator grazing and gazing, guaranteed pandemic pandemonium.

Twitch & Shout

Motherless Brooklyn – 2019 – R

When you think of memorable private detectives from the world of fiction, who pops into your mind? Here’s mine: Sherlock Holmes created by British author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and television’s Columbo, 1971-2003 with Peter Falk. Add to the PI pool, Motherless Brooklyn’s Lionel Essrog (Edward Norton) a most unusual private detective working cases in 1950’s New York. Lionel suffers from Tourette’s syndrome, a condition that causes repetitive movements, unwanted sounds (tics) and barking out words or phrases at the most inopportune “you have no idea how inconvenient” times. To balance the awkward nature of blurting out what ever comes to mind, Lionel is blessed with a photographic memory that runs like a videotape of conversations, encounters and scenes, a priceless gift when it comes to piecing together the puzzle of detective mysteries.

Lionel owes most good things in his life, including his job as a private investigator, to Frank Minna (Bruce Willis) who became his father figure and mentor by rescuing him, a troubled kid, from an orphanage operated by stereotypical cruel Roman Catholic nuns. Frank’s unorthodox PI agency is made up of Lionel and three other orphanage refugees, Gilbert (Ethan Suplee), Danny (Dallas Roberts) and Tony (Bobby Cannavale), the “Minna Men,” who Frank brings together to do odd urban jobs with the barest PI undertones.

Early in the film Frank bites the dust, victim of a blackmail scheme of his own undoing and Lionel makes it his moral quest to solve the who done it, suddenly needing to tap authentic PI skills, a cut well above his current errand boy, faux PI door shingle. But Lionel’s encyclopedic memory kicks in full blast and the hunt is on. Understandably Lionel’s unwavering, zealous loyalty to father Frank holds true as he relentlessly digs to solve Frank’s dumpster alley murder. Even when Lionel’s life is on the line, even when he’s offered the keys to the “You can do whatever you want and no one can stop you,” NYC kingdom by ruthless, brilliant politician and corrupt charismatic megalomaniac Moses Randolph (Alec Baldwin), Lionel sticks to unraveling the clues on his avenging path. The epic scene between Moses and Lionel is one Biblical aficionados will find reminiscent of Satan tempting Jesus in the wilderness:

Matthew 4:8-10
Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor. “All this I will give you,” he said, “if you will bow down and worship me.” Jesus said to him, “Away from me, Satan! For it is written: ‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve him only.’”

This neo-noir crime odyssey takes off when Lionel stumbles into a plethora of colorful characters as he gumshoes his way to a jazz club in Harlem and falls for beautiful Laura Rose (Gugu Mbatha-Raw), daughter of club owner Billy (Robert Ray Wisdom) or, scratch that, daughter of scruffy Paul Randolph (Willem Dafoe) or daughter of…..sorry, can’t say, big, BIG spoiler so stick with the film’s 144 minutes (dear editor, please cut 30 minutes) and hang on to your Stetson fedora for the BIG reveal. Here’s your clue, the key is a key. Keep it under your hat.

Why should you shell out $4.99 to rent this film? Because of the utterly believable entanglement of fascinating, endearing relationships delivered by a first rate, stellar cast; the myriad of dazzling period piece shots of the mean streets of New York; the exquisite, feather light jazz score; and, the “power corrupts” social commentary pitting the crooked and omnipotent against the poor and dispossessed. Set time aside during your rental window to watch Motherless Brooklyn not once but twice, there are so many twists and turns and snaky, shifting subplots that you can’t take digest all the intertwined layers without a replay. Does Lionel light a match in the Borough Authority darkness? Does David take down Goliath? Grab your slingshot and a pocketful of stones and rag-tag along!

This film was twenty years in the making, Edward Norton acquired the rights to Jonathan Lethem’s novel, Motherless Brooklyn, in 1998. There are interesting historical parallels you can review here before, or better, after watching the fictional account.

Torrid Beauty

Portrait of a Lady On Fire – 2019 – R

Set in the late 18th century on a remote windswept island off the coast of Brittany, this French-language film, released in France in 2019, tells the story of Marianne (Noémie Merlant), a beautiful young mainland artist commissioned to paint the portrait of equally beautiful young islander Héloïse (Adèle Haenel). Héloïse was called home from a convent to step into an arranged bride-to-be lineup because her older sister stepped off a cliff rather than be given away in matchmaker’s nuptials. Héloïse’s mother, La Comtesse (Valeria Golino) needs a portrait for the Milanese nobleman who is now considering marrying her second daughter. Ironically termed the Age of Enlightenment, marriages of the nobility in this era were finalized via life size painted portraits delivered for review to the potential suitor. Defiant, strong willed Héloïse isn’t having it. No portrait, no wedding. This is where Marianne comes in. No portrait, no commission. Rounding out the all female cast, a third young woman, Sophie (Luàna Bajrami), the house maid is befriended by Marianne and Héloïse and when Sophie gets pregnant, in solidarity they accompany her to the village to get an abortion.

Personal female power and choices are exercised despite living in an era of negligible to no options for women. The film’s powerful ending—of enduring yet unrequited love, contained in requisite yet intolerable cultural norms—is as understandable as it is unfathomable. The story’s resolution will linger long after you’ve left the theater. There is no tragedy here but there is an empty ache for more, more of what simply can’t be.

It’s not a spoiler to disclose that Marianne gets her commission, the mother-daughter arranged marriage plot is simply a period piece vehicle for the mysterious, erotic, forbidden fruit romance to emerge between Marianne and Héloïse. Their mutual attraction so sensual, so exquisitely luxurious that this love story is already mentioned as one of the best 100 movies of the decade, indeed a masterpiece.

The cinematography is beyond stunning with an intoxicating palate of colors framing every scene. Art and literature merge as readings from Ovid’s version of Orpheus and Eurydice foreshadow a poignant, heartbreaking exchange between the lesbian lovers.

The music is electrifying, euphoric. The third movement of “Summer” from Vivaldi’s “Four Seasons” plaintively ties together the hope and hopelessness of taboo love. A late night bonfire gathering of island women transcends into a haunting, masterful choral number of Latin chants, “fugere non possum,” “I cannot flee” and “Nos resurgemus,” “We rise.”

It’s a shame that France submitted Les Misérables for the Academy’s Best International Film category because Writer/Director Céline Sciamma’s Portrait of a Lady On Fire would have certainly challenged Parasite for Best Picture. Aside from a few jarring male appearances, the cast consists entirely of women and was written, directed and filmed by women. Nos resurgemus. We rise.

Portrait of the Past

The Photograph – 2020 – PG13

The Photograph parallels two couples along a multi-narrative romantic storyline, moving fluidly between the 1980s and present day; and between New York City and Pointe á la Hache, Louisiana, a small fishing village on the eastern banks of the Mississippi River near New Orleans.

We learn through a soft spoken, gently unfurling narrative and a soothing jazz and rich R&B score that young, handsome Isaac Jefferson (Rob Morgan), content as a crab fisherman in his humble Louisiana abode, falls in love with restless,“I don’t want the most exciting part of my day to be cooking your dinner” Christina Eames (Chantè Adams), an aspiring photographer. After a sultry tryst in a New Orleans jazz club—and despite Isaac’s refurbishing a shed into a darkroom—Christina chooses adventure over matrimony and unbeknownst to family, friends and Isaac, buys a one-way bus ticket to Manhattan where she starts a new life.

Thirty years later journalist Mike Block (Lakeith Stanfield), pursuing a human interest story on the demise of *post-Deepwater Horizon Gulf fishing, interviews a balding and bespectacled Isaac and is drawn to a vintage black & white photo on Isaac’s mantle, Pointe á la Hache’s hometown Mona Lisa. The haunting portrait leads Mike from the luxuriant, verdant Louisiana countryside hugging the mighty Mississippi River, to vibrant, energetic, metropolitan Queens where he tracks down museum curator, stunning Mae Morton (Issa Rae), estranged and grieving daughter of recently deceased, highly acclaimed photographer Christina Eames, the subject of Isaac’s photograph.

The movie weaves the promising yet ultimately unrequited love story of Christina and Isaac with the blossoming yet cautionary romance of Mae and Mike. Flipping roles, Christina sought new horizons in cosmopolitan New York while Mae latches on to the predictable and practical. Isaac was satisfied with the Louisiana known while Mike yearns for London change. Will generational lessons be applied and wisdom taken to heart or will a new generation of broken hearts prevail, like mother like daughter? Mae inherits two confessional letters penned by Christina, one for Mae and one for Mae’s father. Will the mysterious contents shed new light on decisions past and future? Will the rueful 1989 words of Christina prove prophetic for Mae, “I wish I was as good at love as I am at working. I wish I didn’t leave people behind so often”?

Only time will tell.

*The 2010 BP Oil Spill, one of the largest environmental disasters in American history, destroyed the fishing industry along the Louisiana coast. For a closer look into the environmental destruction and corporate cruelty, sign up on IMDb’s Watchlist to see the 2014 documentary, Vanishing Pearls: The Oystermen of Point à la Hache.

Pole Plant

Downhill – 2020 – R

Pete (Will Ferrell) and Billie (Julia Louis-Dreyfus) with their two pre-teen sons, Finn (Julian Grey) and Emerson (Ammon Ford) are settling into a family ski vacation in the Austrian Alps. From the get-go Pete and Julia’s relationship appears strained but then explodes into a no doubter when, as an avalanche roars down the slopes, Pete saves his phone and abandons his family. The avalanche turns tame, harmlessly dusting Billie and the boys with a coat of snow but burying fleeing Pete under a stigma of weakness, negligence and cowardice. The harder poor Pete tries to dig out, the deeper he sinks, Billie icing him and the boys preferring screen time to father-son time. Pete’s best shot at making amends is a surprise, heli-skiing family outing, earning an enthusiastic thumbs-up by the boys, but a Billie brawl over a missing $2 mitten forces pathetic Pete to forfeit the $2,000 adventure. Pitiful. Ugh. Remind me, why is this film billed a comedy?

Frankly, the film falls somewhere between downer and snoozer. I was an okay downhill skier in days of yore so, instead of tracking the Staunton family feud, I found myself marveling at the different styles of skis, now and (way back) then. Wow, how equipment changes over 30 years! Instead of rooting for more than a kiss between Billie and Guglielmo, her ski instructor gigolo, I reverted to sweet memories of taking my two young sons skiing in the Sierra Nevada. My meandering thoughts eventually morphed into full blown daydreaming. To be fair, at regular intervals I’d snap back from California to Austria, give the film another chance, only to mentally bail, despairing at Downhill’s glacial pace, akin to snowploughing down a Black Diamond run. If I weren’t fighting a nap, I’d grow weary of Billie’s contorted facial expressions or shrieking diatribe. Ugh. She was cold, rude and genuinely unpleasant. I expected much more from Julia Louis-Dreyfus. Epic wipe out. Will Ferrell, not one of my favorite actors anyway, lived down to my expectations. If there were an award category for best performance as a cardboard cutout, he’d win uncontested. Dull, dull, dull. Ugh. Again.

I’d advise director Nat Fazin (Charlie’s Angels) to grab a rope tow to the bunny slope and stay there. Myself, I’ll drift back to my four decade old youthful escapades at Heavenly Valley or Badger Pass or China Peak, finding more entertainment in the ghosts of ski slopes past than Downhill could offer in it’s mercifully short 85 minutes. My final word. Ugh.

Birds of a Feather Fight Together

Birds of Prey – 2020 – R

The last time I was motivated by a movie to go total badass was in 1969. True confession, right after seeing Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, I started shooting up the parking lot with my imaginary six-guns while scanning the shopping center for a bank to rob. Forgive me, I was young and impressionable. Five decades later, leaving the theater after watching Birds of Prey, I started practicing spins, kicks and jabs walking to my car. Good thing there was no one near the theater to head butt or leg sweep or Karate Kid Crane Kick! Forgive me, I’m old and impressionable.

Females dominate Birds of Prey. It is written, directed, and produced by women; features a ridiculously brilliant soundtrack that includes 15 exclusive new tracks, all from female artists; and stars five diverse women who clearly relish their roles. Harley Quinn (Margot Robbie) exudes the confidence and sheer brassiness of a reigning D.C. moll except she’s on her own. Jilted by Joker, her madman oasis of security is now a mirage and maniacal Gotham City revenge-seekers are gleefully closing in for the kill. Most of the film is Harley thrashing these foes with cartwheeling, catapulting, take-no-prisoner maneuvers until she’s sadly sold out by her one and only friend, Doc, the elderly owner of a Chinese restaurant who delivers Harley into the hands of psychopathic crime boss, Black Mask (Ewan McGregor). Her life literally hanging in the balance, Harley is one knife slice away from losing face before she cuts a deal to recover a prized diamond that landed in the possession of teenage pickpocket extraordinaire Cassandra Cain (Ella Jay Basco). Cassie lives in the same tenement as Harley, mostly exiled to the stairwell escaping abusive foster care. Harley offers Cassie a semblance of sisterhood, the first revealing peek at Harley’s liberated joker-less heart.

Cue three other colorful female characters that, with Harley and Cassie, dominate the last part of the film, a female quintet of empowerment and redemption. Helena Bertinelli, aka Huntress “The Crossbow Killer” (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) is out to even the score with Gotham mafia men who executed her family when she was a child. Dinah Lance, soulful lounge singer, aka Black Canary (Jurnee Smollett-Bell) is about to find her voice after turning away silent one too many times as her bar boss, Black Mask, sexually assaults female patrons. Gotham City detective Renee Montoya (Rosie Perez), done losing hard-earned recognition to a police force ruled by misogyny, crosses over to embrace her feminist wild side. Uniting these five as Birds of Prey is the common purpose of reaping righteous havoc on the villains of Gotham, bringing a testosterone track record of destruction, perversion and exploitation to a deliciously satisfying, rip-roaring, raucous end.

The most compelling moments of this comic-book-come-to-life movie were two occasions when self-interest prevailed over friendship. First Harley confronts Doc and then Cassandra confronts Harley about trading their lives to Black Mask for personal gain. Doc listens, shrugs, pockets his bounty and drives off. Harley tries to blow Cassie off with a ho hum, “I’m just a horrible person” but clearly is affected at a level that will ultimately be revealed late in the film. Definitely worth the wait.

Don’t shy away from this movie or misjudge it as gaudy graphic novel schlock because you will miss an entertaining cinematic bonanza. The music is a blast. The action is crazy fun! The bad guys lose, the good gals win. The fight sequences outrageous, outlandish and awesome. The female cast, after months of training and practice, performed most of the fight scenes themselves, no stunt doubles need apply. Definitely time to enroll in a martial arts class! Who’s with me?!

Mob Men

The Gentlemen – 2020 – R

Just for fun stop by the snack bar and forego the popcorn for a giant salted pretzel to eat in sync with this movie’s spiraling twists, turns and twirls. Mickey (Matthew McConaughey), an American in London offers to sell his thriving British underground marijuana farms to fellow American billionaire, sleazy Matthew (Jeremy Strong, Succession) and blissfully exercise early retirement to fully enjoy Rosalind, Mickey’s stiletto-heeled wife (Michelle Dockery, Downton Abbey) who runs an auto-repair garage staffed exclusively by women. But the lucrative drug trafficking opportunity is chumming the River Thames luring all manner of hungry fresh water sharks to the city. Taking the bait is Chinese gangster “Lord George“ (Tom Wu) but his underboss “Dry Eye” (Henry Golding, Crazy Rich Asians), strutting his independence and representing the up and coming Asian gangsta youth movement, shoots a different plan to Lord George. Crooked private investigator/paparazzi reporter Fletcher (Hugh Grant) is cheerily dedicating his telephoto lens and camouflage expertise to blackmail Mickey’s #1 henchman Ray (Charlie Hunnam, Sons of Anarchy) by selling the unfolding, exclusive, murdering mob and dope tale to tabloid owner “Big Dave” (Eddie Marsan, Vice) who is determined to enact revenge on Mickey who publicly snubbed diminutive Big Dave at a highfalutin London party. Whew! There you have it. Full circle. Mickey to Matthew to Lord George to Dry Eye to Fletcher to Ray to Big Dave back to Mickey. Well, not quite. There is “Coach” (Colin Farrell), neighborhood legend boxing coach who winds up owing three favors to Mickey because Coach’s stable of brawling, YouTube viral-seeking karate kids overstepped their gym boundaries into Mickey’s business. Coach not only pays off his debt but throws in one machine gun rescue as a bonus fourth favor. Then there’s the Russian connection with former KGB czar daddy who takes exception to Aslan (Danny Griffin), his heir-apparent son face-planting the London sidewalk from two stories up, winding up in a body bag in Ray’s home freezer. On the heels of Aslan’s fall from fame is the demise of anorexic Laura (Eliot Sumner), daughter of Lord Pressfield (Samuel West). Lord Pressfield is an estate beneficiary of Matthew’s enterprise, a literal “overlord.” His income is cut off because of tangling with the karate kid gang but Mickey, trying to make amends, promises to rescue Laura who gets mixed up with Aslan and it’s a big heroin mess. Follow the Moscow Mule to the White Widow Super Cheese weed. Cannabis chaos.

The entire movie is framed as a conversation between manic Fletcher and deliberate Ray. Fletcher pitches to Ray, typed up as a screen play at a $20 million price tag, the damning, blackmailing evidence he’s clandestinely gathered. Ok? Got it? If it’s any comfort, it took me so long to diagnose the movie-within-a-movie format that I missed important clues flying by in the fast and furious dialogue. Fletcher talked way too fast and Ray way too slow. The British slang went over my head. I like to think of myself as able to cope with the circuitous but this movie took such a scenic route that I wished for an occasional linear respite. For all I know the movie-within-the-movie was the movie. Confused? Me, too. Maybe buy two pretzels.

Ducks, Dubs & Duds

Dolittle – 2020 – PG

When my granddaughter was four years old we went to see How to Train Your Dragon (2010) and about five minutes in she leaned over and whispered in my ear, “Nana, I think this is a boy movie.” Well, ditto to Dolittle. It’s definitely a children’s film and has everything a small fry audience, especially packed with boys, enjoys: farts, poop, burps, spit, vomit and gorilla mooning. How about this for a crowd pleaser, “Something smells wrong, and that’s coming from a guy who loves the smell of butts,” blurts Dolittle’s scruffy dog. But brace yourself for this spoiler: Dolittle diagnoses a female dragon with constipation, so to unclog her system he reaches up her rear and pulls a bunch of eclectic junk out, from human bones to a giant leek to bagpipes. Anal animation. Sigh. Can you imagine a Dr. Dolittle-themed birthday party? It puts a new spin on that childhood rite of passage “playing doctor.”

Then there’s Robert Downey Junior who stayed in character by simply playing himself. His irascible, unkempt, unappealing self. By the end of the film he’s graduated from unkempt to merely disheveled. A little of RDJ goes a long way and Dolittle is a lot! And please no Scottish brogue ever again. Fingernails across a chalkboard preferable. Stick with Ironman.

The film was shelved in 2019 and then pushed back into production, infused with millions more until it maxed out at a bloated, obscene $175 million budget. Universal execs said no más and a hot mess is what we get. Besides banal toilet humor and RDJ’s Scottish For Dummies delivery, we get dialogue so poorly dubbed that it doesn’t match the menagerie‘s mouths, bad technical post-production lip-sync, bird beak speak that looks like an amateur hour tape delay…$175 million…how does that even happen?

Dolittle lived up to it’s title, doing little for my entertainment value but then I’m old and female. For me it was like watching a 100 minute Aflac commercial. In the space of two months we inherit Cats and Dolittle as the new Hollywood standard, the metric to measure flops, fiascos and failures. The stuff of memories. Go see Dolittle just so someday we can all look back and say, “By god, we were there.”

Good Old Boys

Bad Boys for Life – 2020 – R

It’s been 25 years since 1995’s Bad Boys narcotic detectives Mike Lowrey (Will Smith) and Marcus Burnett (Martin Lawrence) went heroin hunting in a black 964-generation Porsche 911. In 2003’s Bad Boys II the Miami duo drive a silver Ferrari 550 Maranello chasing down ecstasy traffickers. The 2020 Bad Boys for Life race around town in a blue Porsche 911 Carrera 4S on the trail of the Mexican cartel. Notice a trend? Good guy detectives Mike and Marcus racing hot cars chasing bad guys. A simple formula that has grossed over $420 million for the Bad Boys franchise.

What changed between Bad Boys I, II and III is obvious: age. The two daring, raucous, adrenaline fueled partners are now middle-aged, older but not that much wiser alpha males. Marcus, a new grandfather retires from the force while Mike, a dedicated badass who prefers to rage, rage against the dying of the light, is critically injured in a drive-by revenge hit. He eventually recovers and pressures Marcus into coming out of retirement, teaming up “one last time” to track down the would be assassin.

Explosions, fires, gangland killings, car chases, helicopter rescues, helicopter crashes, automotive carnage, motorcycle wheelies and sidecar splits, pit bulls, drones, bombs, bullets and rocket launchers, all spike the body count of death and destruction. Add in cartel killing machine Armando Aretas (Jacob Scipio) and his revenge hungry, Mike-hating mother Isabel Aretas (Kate del Castillo), a Mexican “witch” who lights candles on a Mexico City rooftop in the name of the cult saint Nuestra Señora de la Santa Muerte (Our Lady of Holy Death), and game on. The “Mike-hating” part is what ratchets the story into more engaging territory than cops, cars and crack.

Mike and Marcus are fearless and fun, wily and witty, bantering and bickering from Miami to Mexico and back. Beyond the loyalty of police force brotherhood these two old friends genuinely care for each other and it shows. Keep counting. There will be a Bad Boys 4. The only question is what kind of car will they drive, Ford or Ferrari?