recommended

Story: It's very simple but honestly that is fine.

There's a more than satisfactory amount of boom-boom in the movie's trim running time.

Mostly, the movie is committed to the value of a good time.

It has been a long time since I watched "Lethal Weapon 4" then "Lethal Weapon." This week, wandering through the movie shelves of my local library I came upon this one on BluRay. Anticipating good video and audio I settled in on a cold Saturday and watched it.As these Lethal Weapon movies go it is a lot of slapstick comedy superimposed on a serious theme. Here a South African diplomat in Los Angeles appears to be involved in drugs and gold, plus money laundering, but uses his diplomatic immunity to keep the cops at arm's length.Mel Gibson is Martin Riggs and his partner is Danny Glover as Roger Murtaugh. Given a $hit assignment they are to guard Joe Pesci as Leo Getz, a sly money-launderer who is in witness protection. The S. Africans want to eliminate him but Riggs and Murtaugh, as haphazard as they may be, are difficult to defeat.The boss of the bad guys is Joss Ackland as S. African diplomat Arjen Rudd. The love interest for Riggs is pretty British actress Patsy Kensit as Dutch Rika Van Den Haas who works for Rudd but is not a crook.Of course none of this is plausible but if you keep reminding yourself that it is just a movie then you will be entertained by watching how the cops eventually bring the S. African crooks to justice.

Riggs (Mel Gibson) and Murtaugh (Danny Glover) are on the trail of South African diplomats who are using their immunity to engage in criminal activities.This is not as "classic" as the original, and lacks that Christmas element, but we have some new fun. Joe Pesci is here, though not used to his fullest. The "diplomatic immunity" idea is great, and there still remains debate to this day (2016) if such a thing could be used to facilitate crime. Allegedly, the Chicago mob used this method in Panama.But the key scene that makes this film memorable is the "toilet bomb" scene. If nothing else, that one scene will make this go down in history as one of the essential buddy cop movies.

Lethal Weapon 2 (1989): Dir: Richard Donner / Cast: Mel Gibson, Danny Glover, Joe Pesci, Patsy Kensit, Joss Ackland: Inferior sequel to Lethal Weapon opens in the middle of a mindless high speed chase where cars flip and crashes abound without much thought on innocent civilians. Mel Gibson returns as Martin Riggs and he is fired up and seems to keep going despite obstacles. His partner, played by Danny Glover is attacked in his home along with his wife by masked assailants. There is a tie here to what happened Riggs and his departed wife. Glover springs some humour when his daughter's big acting break comes within a condom commercial prompting ribbing at work. Joe Pesci is also quite comically engaging as a witness they are assigned to protect. Pesci is loud and obnoxious yet seemingly likable. Patsy Kensit plays the secretary to the film's villain. She hates her job and becomes the next romantic interest to Riggs but one cannot help but dislike the handling of this character, especially given the already dreaded past of Riggs. The villains have all the life of a store window mannequin with laughable thugs with shampoo looking long hair that seems fresh out of a commercial. The action is over the top with lots of bullets flying and Riggs going full force on survival. In the end the original film packs a much higher lethal delivery. Score: 4 ½ / 10

'Lethal Weapon 2' is the absolute perfect example of why the eighties were the renaissance of the action film. I've seen so many bad action films that it becomes hard to decipher what makes an excellent one but I feel that 'Lethal Weapon 2' should be studied as an example. It has all the ingredients I think are essential to making a good action film. The movie most importantly has incredible loud action sequences that have weight because they aren't mired in computer effects or post production trickery and have stunt performers. It also isn't fearful in indulging in violence without being gratuitous. It isn't realistic and there's theatricality but it's not at the two extremes of cartoony blood or PG-13 action fast cuts when someone gets shot. It has grit and blood but it's also so alive with great characters.Most importantly are the characters and the acting. This film solves the problem of the first film in having memorable villains. The whole South Africa apartheid villainy is played for all the hate you can project on these goofy characters. Joss Ackland is so delightful. His performance masterfully skates at being just campy enough to get all the smiles you can without going into the ridiculous. But of course the bulk of the praise must go to the leads. Glover and Gibson are so charismatic and likable that the scenes where they drive to the shoot outs are still highly entertaining. I had a ball revisiting this one.