Sight&Sound - 04.2020

REVIEWS

64 | Sight&Sound | April 2019

Reviewed by Tim Hayes

Don Simpson has been dead for 24 years, but

the sight of his name in the opening credits

of Bad Boys for Life brings a warm Pavlovian

sense of authenticity. In the current swamp of

recycled characters and defibrillated franchises,

might this one be about to go properly back to

the future, recreating the original caffeinated

excess that Simpson, Jerry Bruckheimer and

director Michael Bay cooked up in 1995 with

Bad Boys? Or at least the unhinged playbook

of disconnected explosions that Bay recently

transferred wholesale to Netflix and called 6

Underground? But Bad Boys was so long ago that

Will Smith took second billing after Martin

Lawrence, and its cop protagonists are now

squarely in their fifties. Any Bay-style low-

angle tracking shots and corkscrew camera

moves in Bad Boys for Life have considerately

slowed down to let the characters catch up.

The release of a third Bad Boys – 17 years after

the previous one and surely connected to the

arrival of spin-off TV series L.A.’s Finest, which

belatedly follows Gabrielle Union’s character

from Bad Boys II (2003) – means that certain

things will happen as a given. Marcus Burnett

(Lawrence) will be attempting to shift into

domesticity and grandparenthood, while partner

Mike Lowrey (Smith) will be having none of

it and continuing the same peacock strut that

got him through the previous movies. Despite

starting a franchise even older than the one here,

Lethal Weapon (1987) remains the solid inspiration

for any film venturing down this path, and once

Burnett and Lowrey leap on a motorbike and

sidecar for some high-speed pursuit, it’s the spirit

of director Richard Donner that looms larger

than anyone’s. Modern rules are unbreakable,

though, so Mike’s previously unknown adult

son turns up and promptly shoots him, allowing

the father to unlock a selection of past regrets

and the offspring to reassess his parentage.

Both men duly obey pop culture’s most heavily

hammered plea and discover a more authentic

individual identity within themselves, in this

case bonding over the casual destruction of

a mother figure shown as an actual witch.

The Fast & Furious franchise has a magnetic

pull here too, in the diverse group of supporting

operatives Mike and Marcus team up with, all

of them genetically perfect. But their mission

is not diverse – just the same business of peace

through redemptive violence that powers this

genre from top to bottom, its original poker face

now locked in position by pure irony. Marcus

prays for his partner’s recovery and promises

not to bring more violence into the world,

in which case he’s in the wrong picture.

Bad Boys for Life

USA 2020

Directors: Adil & Bilall

Certificate 15 123m 47s

Miami, present day. Detective Marcus Burnett

tells partner Mike Lowrey that he is retiring. Mike

is shot by hitman Armando on the instructions

of Armando’s mother Isabel, but survives. When

Marcus declines to help him pursue Armando,

Mike teams up with a police tactical unit led by

ex-girlfriend Rita to hunt the shooter. Marcus joins

Mike on the case after Armando murders their boss

Captain Howard. Mike realises that Armando is his

son, born while Mike was undercover in Isabel’s

drug cartel. The trail leads to Mexico City, where

Isabel confirms Armando’s parentage. She tries to

kill Mike, but Armando intervenes. Rita becomes

police captain. Mike and Marcus reconcile.

Directed by

Adil & Bilall

[i.e. Adil El Arbi,

Bilall Fallah]

Produced by

Jerry Bruckheimer

Will Smith

Doug Belgrad

Screenplay

Chris Bremner

Peter Craig

Joe Carnahan

Story

Peter Craig

Joe Carnahan

Director of

Photography

Robrecht Heyvaert

Editors

Peter McNulty

Dan Lebental

Production Designer

Jon Billington

Music

Lorne Balfe

Sound Designer

Steve Ticknor

Costume Designer

Dayna Pink

Stunt Co-ordinator

Mike Gunther

Visual Effects

Soho VFX

Mammal Studios

©Columbia Pictures

Industries Inc. and

2.0 Entertainment

Production

Companies

Columbia Pictures

presents in

association with

2.0 Entertainment

a Don Simpson/

Jerry Bruckheimer

production

An Overbrook/2.0

Entertainment

production

Executive Producers

Chad Oman

Mike Stenson

Barry Waldman

James Lassiter

Cast

Will Smith

Detective Lieutenant

Michael Lowrey, ‘Mike’

Martin Lawrence

Detective Lieutenant

Marcus Burnett

Vanessa Hudgens

Kelly

Alexander Ludwig

Dorn

Charles Melton

Rafe

Paola Nunez

Rita

Kate Del Castillo

Isabel Aretas

Nicky Jam

Zway-Lo

Joe Pantoliano

Captain Conrad

Howard

Jacob Scipio

Armando Aretas

Theresa Randle

Theresa

Khaled (DJ

Khaled) Khaled

Manny

Happy Anderson

Jenkins

Dolby Atmos

In Colour

[2.35:1]

Some screenings

in ScreenX

Distributor

Sony Pictures

Releasing

Oldboys: Will Smith, Martin Lawrence

Credits and Synopsis

backgrounds, undoubtedly powers the

sense of personal stakes and emotional

heft. Goodes is a thoughtful, articulate subject

and Grant adds rousing rhetoric. And the

deployment of talking heads directly addressing

the camera creates an aptly provocative feel.

Such stylistic choices do also contribute,

alongside justifiable admiration for its

protagonist, to the film occasionally veering

close to hagiography. The Australian Dream

largely becomes the official retelling of one

man’s nightmare. The complex debate around

the media treatment of the 13-year-old girl

ejected from an AFL match by Goodes for

her ‘ape’ taunt, and around the different

connotations of booing players at sporting

events, feels frustratingly curtailed. To the film’s

credit, though, it includes oppositional figures

such as tone-deaf conservative commentator

Andrew Bolt. And it cannily charts the shocking

rapidity with which the establishment and

social-media trolls turn when a national

hero dares to transform into the culturally

unacceptable ‘black man who complains’.

Goodes’s soul-searching walkabout makes

for striking Outback sequences, though visual

coups are generally at a premium. A brooding

electronica soundtrack bolsters the unsettling

mood, and it’s perhaps better to view the

film more in the Indigenous tradition of oral

storytelling: speaking out against past and

present prejudice and reclaiming an often

whitewashed narrative, which Goodes, Grant

and Gordon relate to righteous, potent effect.

A documentary on Adam Goodes, who was raised

by a single Aboriginal mother and became a legend

of Australian Rules Football and a passionate

opponent of racial prejudice. As Goodes learns

more about his Indigenous roots, he becomes

increasingly outspoken. When he has a 13-year-

old girl ejected from a match for racist taunting,

a huge backlash ensues that profoundly affects

him and causes widespread reflection about the

country’s racial history and behaviour. Despite

strong support and his ongoing commitment to the

cause, Goodes eventually decides to quit the sport.

Produced by

Sarah Thomson

Nick Batzias

Virginia Whitwell

John Battsek

Producer

Goodthings

Productions:

Charlotte Wheaton

Written by

Stan Grant

Directors of

Photography

Dylan River

Michael Timney

Editor

Matt Wyllie

Music

Cornel Wilczek

Pascal Babare

Thomas E. Rouch

Sound Recordists

David Tranter

Andy Boag

©Passion Pictures,

GoodThing

Productions Pty Ltd

Production

Companies

Screen

Australia, Lorton

Entertainment,

The Australian

Broadcasting

Corporation,

Passion Pictures

and Goodthing

Productions present

in association

with Madman

Entertainment, Film

Victoria, Verymuchso

Productions and

Uninterrupted

Passion Pictures

supported by the

BFI’s Film Fund

Produced in

association with

The Australian

Broadcasting

Corporation

Executive

Producers

Paul Wiegard

Andrew Ruhemann

Ben Simmons

Julian Bird

Joel Kennedy

Tommy Gordon

In Colour

[1.85:1]

Distributor

Dogwoof

Credits and Synopsis