Not really surprised that so many people loved the movie, but I thought it was a nearly entirely bad movie, and I went in good faith, to have fun and a few laughs. I got a few laughs, but no more, about 80% of the jokes don't really land, and the movie careens between absurd emotional responses, to absurd and entirely unbelievable action sequences. What is missing is the money, and Bay's technical style, though he is, in his own right, a terrible director.
This felt cheap, the direction was lacking, the script stale, and the laughable, probably offensive portrayal by Kate Del Castillo was awful. (I wrote some pages back on the tastelessness of Del Castillo's role, given her involvement with Chapo Guzman, but won't expand here) I won't pick apart the absurdity of the cartel and plot, that isn't fair in a movie like this, but at least, they could go a level or two higher. The script is drenched in cliches, and cannot recover from the awfulness of them. "The cartel is going to have back up". "He fights like me, he's ruthless like me". "Hasta la fuego". None of the emotional scenes are earned, and none of the action is interesting.
A literal pit of hell at the climax, to which the witch is thrown into? The son arch was predictable, yes, but thats forgivable, but how laughable that he is redeemed for what has to be at least a dozen murders or more in Miami, including the close friend of Smith's character. That's lazy and shallow, but I expect a largely passive audience will go for it. I don't blame Will or Martin, when they work, it's funny, but too often the script saddles them with bad lines and unfunny rants, and there is not even a semblance of believability to the entire spectacle.
Bad Boys had that, Bad Boys 2 had a semblance of it, Bad Boys For Life, so clearly follows the lead of franchises like Fast & Furious, where the world creation supersedes writing, acting plot, it's all just a circus show to hang a franchise, and hey that's the game, but a bad movie, is a bad movie. The scene where the one guy tackled a concrete pillar? That's all Fast and Furious style action. The movie also seemed to take a lot from the worst of the last two James Bond movies, that helicopter sequence, the son angle, the villan encaged in some sort of glass cell?
I watched most of Bad Boys 2 last night, and found that to be largely unenjoyable movie, but at least it looked good. The writing was worse than I remember, but the actors sold it better, and the wide frame action sequences, though stupefyingly boring, were at least not the caliber of a C list action movie. And there are some very funny comedic sequences that this movie lacks. I didn't remember how ugly it all was those, with the constant homophobia, and Bay's constant cruelty. But, it looked good.
This looked like an amateur director on a mid budget action movie. The hamfisted attempts to bring in current events (***** posts of killings going viral) go nowhere, and feel like the work of old white men, who are three news cycles behind the rest of us.
Joe Carnahan should not be writing jokes for Will and Martin. The ones that land "Fly together, die together', "I see why you dress like a drug dealer", "he's my uber driver", are funny, but the two are never allowed to breathe, the material seems drowned out by an inane and brutally dragged out plot, that never really generates any tension or suspense, on any level. An example of the movie not letting anything breathe is the Reggie plot. He's the mantle piece of one of the franchises funnier sequences, and what fun does the film have with him? A 5 second cameo and a near nonexistent scene at his own wedding.
Did anyone think Mike was going to die? No, of course not. The arbitrary "6 Months later", the fact that the local prosecutor and the DA were partying half naked on a yacht? I get it's Miami, but still. Another thing, I love Miami, gorgeous vibrant city, awash in culture, crime, violence, interesting people and beautiful scenery. Aside from a few stock shots of South Beach, and the opening, you get no sense of the city. Even the big nightclub scene doesn't really ring true.
In part, I have probably long outgrown these kinds of movies, for many reasons. I remember the first Bad Boys in 1995, when I was 10 or so, my friends and I lived for those kinds of movies. We bought toy guns and rifles from swap meets and shot at each other with air soft BB guns, for the love of those movies, and the violence they showed us. Now, I see running gunfights and car chases, as boring and tired. I went to see this because of how much Will shined in his BC interview, the movie is not worthy of his talents, even in his later years.
nikkas was in the movies watching it like it was a Christopher Nolan film 
