Lethal Weapon (1987)

Buddy-based L.A. police drama that’s very much an inferior version of Beverly Hills Cop. I wanted to see what all the fuss was about, but I couldn’t really. 

Mel Gibson plays a “troubled” policeman wrestling with bereavement and mental health issues. He’s teamed up with Danny Glover to investigate the death of a woman who appears to have leaped from an apartment balcony. 

It’s a little hammy, the villains (including Gary Busey) are woefully one-dimensional and it feels very “TV movie” in places. But Gibson and Glover work well together, with a certain chemistry, even though the macho aspects of the plot are ludicrous. At the end, for example, Gibson engages in a lengthy fight with the villain when he could have simply arrested him. 

To some extent, you have to buy into Gibson’s whole style – twitchy and “on the edge” – for the film to work at all. If you can’t engage with his persona, or you find him merely ridiculous, then you’re left with a fairly ordinary thriller. 

My copy is the “director’s cut” but I’ve no idea what was removed or added for this version. 

It’s worth watching if you’re curious about 1980s blockbusters, as I am, but I don’t ever need to see it again.