TheRetroCritic

A whopping 6 years after Lethal Weapon 3 , we somehow got another sequel to the iconic buddy cop action franchise starring Mel Gibson as loose cannon Martin Riggs and Danny Glover as Roger "Too Old For This Shit" Murtaugh. A little older but not much wiser, the LAPD duo are still taking on bad guys in the streets in the most destructive and explosive ways possible but now, with Riggs' girlfriend Lorna (Rene Russo) and Murtaugh's daughter being pregnant, they're having to consider their age and their future. On top of that, you've got a Chinese immigrant smuggling ring being exposed which builds into a money laundering masterplan led by Jet Li's intimidating villain. And, of course, Leo (Joe Pesci) is thrown in there for added comic relief, as if having Chris Rock fast-talking his way through some of his leftover stand-up routines wasn't enough. It's a bit of a bloated, unfocused script and one wishes that some of it had been edited out or poli

After the box-office hit that was Lethal Weapon , Richard Donner came back to direct this sequel which, of course, once again starred Mel Gibson and Danny Glover as mismatched buddy cops Riggs and Murtaugh. This time, the duo face off against a group of South African drug dealers seemingly untouchable due to their diplomatic immunity claims. The film is much lighter than the original in tone at first with a focus on car chases and our main guys interacting like an old married couple, as ever. There's much less of a spotlight on Riggs' suicidal tendencies this time but his late wife's murder eventually comes into play later on in the film, leading us to a surprisingly dark but rewarding denouement. Murtaugh has a lot to deal with in this movie in that pretty much everything that happens to him sees him become the laughing stock of the force: whether it's his daughter starring in a condom commercial or sitting on a toilet bomb. Riggs is given a new love interest in P

I guess I had to review a Christmas movie at some point... You might be surprised to hear this but I actually have nothing against the first two Home Alone movies: they're charming, harmless, simple little Christmassy flicks and overall fun kids' movies. I loved them back in the day and I still find them somewhat enjoyable, albeit in a mostly nostalgic, soppy way. This sequel is often accused of being a retread of the first film and, frankly, it is but it does enough things differently that it remains completely watchable and doesn't feel too heavy-handed. Macaulay Culkin's Kevin is unsurprisingly once again left to his own devices after taking the wrong plane following a misunderstanding at the airport. He is not left "home alone" this time as much as he his left... alone. He arrives in New York while his family enjoys a disappointingly rainy Christmas in Miami and, instead of freaking out like most kids would in this situation, he decides to start sp