Bad Boys (1995)

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For as much as I actually enjoyed the most recent of these films for what they were as decently done bits of nostalgia, I can honestly say that they really don't have anything on the first two Michael Bay flicks for me. And oh yeah, I say that knowing full well that 'Bad Boys II' is the lowest-rated among them. Hell, that one's actually my favourite, but we'll get to all that in that review. For now, let's go in the way-back machine to 1995. Will Smith and Martin Lawrence were established comedy TV superstars with their respective shows, and ready to move on up.

As it turns out, the casting for this new concept for a different take on a buddy cop movie couldn't have worked out better. The film introduces us to funny but fierce family man, Marcus Burnett (Lawrence) and smooth-talkin' lady magnet, Mike Lowrey (Smith); a couple of renegade cops whose foul language and violent attitudes were perfect for us 12-13-year-olds back in the day who were actively watching 'Fresh Prince' and 'Martin' at the time. So yeah, I fondly remember some parental units having a time with this, and that's just part of what makes it classic.

Lifelong friends, the pair have become narcotics detectives for the Miami PD, under their Captain, Conrad Howard (Joe Pantoliano). Upon their biggest career bust of $100 million worth of Mafia heroin, they, and the rest of the department come to work one day to find the evidence cleared out from the evidence vault. Unless they can recover said heroine in the next 72 hours, Internal Affairs, headed by Alison Sinclair (Marg Helgenberger), threatens to shut down the whole department.

This leads Mike to seek out one of his informants, Maxine Logan (Karen Alexander), to look for suspects who have suddenly become rich, leading her, along with her friend Julie Mott (Téa Leoni) to be hired as "escorts" by former crooked cop, Eddie Dominguez (Emmanuel Xuereb). Soon enough, the party is crashed by Dominguez's French drug kingpin boss Fouchet (Tchéky Karyo) and his henchmen, almost immediately leading Mike and Marcus into murder territory along with their efforts to relocate the stolen heroin.

As Julie becomes a surviving witness, wires become crossed on the identities of Mike and Marcus, providing some comedy throughout most of the movie in which Marcus has to try to pose as Mike, and vise-versa, to some pretty comical results. It's funny, I'm not generally for a lot of bickering in movies, but there's something about Smith and Lawrence's back-and-forth in these movies that one can't help but love. I think more than anything it's the couple of times they use their anger for each other on other people, which not only gets funny, but somehow kinda badass as well.

What I liked best about checking this out recently for the first time in years is that it provides one hell of an interesting time capsule. This was before Smith became a box office draw of immeasurable proportions, and it's also when Martin Lawrence was in his prime. To top it all off, I just remember this being a hard-R-rated movie for the time due to its violence and language, and being one of those movies a guy like me almost had to sneak around to finally see. I got to it upon its video release, but I've always hated the fact that I never got to see it on the big screen... maybe one day.

Is it worth going back and checking out now? Does it hold up? Well, it was 1995, so there's a few bits and pieces of it as far as tech and police-working technique that's more than bloody likely dated to all hell at this point. That said, I really must say that this was something that helped define Michael Bay's overall style, and it was all so much better when it was still in the 90s. It's high action, swearing, violence, explosions, and fast camera work at its finest, and as a classic action flick, I can still highly recommend it!

4/5

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