Lethal Weapon 4

Infobox_Film
name = Lethal Weapon 4

---

caption = "Lethal Weapon 4" movie poster
writer = Screenplay:
Channing Gibson
Story:
Jonathan Lemkin
Alfred Gough
Miles Millar
starring = Mel Gibson
Danny Glover
Joe Pesci
Rene Russo
Chris Rock
Jet Li
director = Richard Donner
producer = Richard Donner
Joel Silver
cinematography = Andrzej Bartkowiak
editing = Dallas Puett
Kevin Stitt
Eric Strand
Frank J. Urioste
music = Michael Kamen
Eric Clapton
David Sanborn
distributor = Warner Bros.
released = July 10, fy|1998
runtime = 127 min.
country = USA
language = English
Cantonese
Mandarin
amg_id = 1:162913
imdb_id = 0122151
budget = $140,000,000 (est.)
gross = $285,444,603
preceded_by = "Lethal Weapon 3"

"Lethal Weapon 4" is a 1998 buddy cop action-comedy film directed by Richard Donner and starring Mel Gibson, Danny Glover, Joe Pesci, Rene Russo, Chris Rock and Jet Li.

ynopsis

In this installment of the "Lethal Weapon" series, Lorna Cole is pregnant with Martin Riggs' baby; they are not married but both are thinking about it and have misgivings and fears. Murtaugh's daughter Rianne is also pregnant and has secretly married Lee Butters, a young cop who works at the same precinct as Murtaugh and Riggs, though she cannot tell her father because he doesn't want her to date cops.

The opening scene is an unrelated sequence in which Riggs and Murtaugh, two LAPD sergeants, confront a lunatic wearing a flame-retardant armored suit and wielding an automatic firearm and a flamethrower. The unidentified man is destroying cars and shops along a city street. Aside from some comedic value and a reminder to the audience of Riggs marksmanship skills, the scene mainly serves to show the two partners informing each other of Lorna's and Rianne's pregnancies. After this scene, a title card shifts the story to "almost nine months later."

The rest of the movie revolves around Riggs, Murtaugh, and Butters' investigation of a Chinese immigrant smuggling ring, which begins after a vessel is captured with a cargo hold of slave labor. That night, Murtaugh, Riggs, and Leo Getz (Pesci)- the latter now a private detective - find a small dinghy alongside with an entire Chinese family, whom he "rescues" and provides shelter for at his house, claiming to be "freeing slaves."

Information about a crime boss known as Uncle Benny (Kim Chan) then leads them to Chinatown, where they are introduced to their new arch-nemesis, a high-ranking Triad negotiator named Wah Sing Ku (played by Jet Li). Wah Sing Ku is organizing the release from prison of four Triad overlords, called the Four Fathers. They are being held by a corrupt Chinese general who demands a huge payoff in exchange for their freedom, but Uncle Benny and Wah Sing Ku plan to give him only counterfeit cash. The captive artist working on the printing plates for the scam is the elder uncle to Hong, the father of the Chinese family Murtaugh has rescued.

Riggs and Murtaugh decide to hire Leo to follow Uncle Benny around, but the Triad feels they are getting too close and decides to strike back. After Hong contacts his uncle, Riggs and Murtaugh come home to find Wah Sing Ku there with the other gang members holding Murtaugh's family hostage; Hong and his family were already taken away. After a brief skirmish (where Wah Sing Ku dismantles Riggs' gun with a flick of his wrist), the entire family is tied up and the house is set on fire with everyone inside, including both pregnant women. Little Ping, the youngest of the Hong children, manages to escape and frees them just in time to break out through the living room window.

Riggs takes a radio from Lorna's car, and the pair set off with Rianne's car in hot pursuit of two of the Triad men. Reaching them on the freeway, Riggs passes the wheel to Murtaugh, climbs out of the car and leaps over to a mobile home. He pulls one of the thugs through the car window into it, demanding to know where the Hongs are. After engaging in a fight they crash onto the road; Riggs, sitting on a table, holds onto the trailer by the plastic covering they fell through, and the Triad man is run over by a bus. His partner accelerates and attempts to kill Riggs, who is forced to throw one of the table legs at the assailant. Murtaugh rams into the Triad car and, hearing sirens, the thug makes an escape. Riggs climbs back beside Murtaugh, and they chase the thug, trying to find answers. However, they accidentally fly off a ramp into a building, driving through one of the floors and out back onto the road. Then the last Triad man they know of is killed by a truck.

Leo alerts them that he had tracked down Uncle Benny at his dentist, and while using Leo as a distraction to keep the dentist busy, Riggs, Murtaugh and Butters use laughing gas to extract information from him. Here Murtaugh inadvertently learns that Butters is the father of his daughter's baby, but puts it aside until later. Uncle Benny mentions the Four Fathers, which the detectives mis-hear as "forefathers"; another detective who knows about Chinese society corrects them on this point and helps them piece the entire operation together. Benny is later strangled to death by Wah Sing Ku for his indiscretion, and Hong is killed as an example to get his uncle to cooperate. When the printing plates are finished, the uncle is killed as well.

Arriving at the meeting between Wah Sing Ku and the corrupt general, Riggs, Murtagh, Butters and several other detectives expose the money that is being used to buy the Four Fathers' release as counterfeit; as a result, the general personally executes three of the Four Fathers. Wah Sing Ku shoots and kills the general, and a firefight breaks out between the cops, the Triad men, and the general's private army in the foreign trade zone down by the docks. During the fight, one of the Four Fathers and older brother to Wah Sing Ku is killed by Murtaugh, and Butters is injured while protecting Murtaugh. The climactic scene takes place on a pier where Riggs and Murtaugh, both unarmed, take on Wah Sing Ku, who is enraged by the death of his brother. Eventually, Murtaugh is knocked out and Riggs and Wah Sing Ku fall into the water as the concrete pier begins to collapse. Wah Sing Ku, after getting brutally beaten as well as impaled, is finally killed by a desperate Riggs unloading an AK-47, but Riggs becomes trapped under part of the broken pier. Murtaugh comes to, realizes Riggs is in the water and dives in to free him.

The next scene shows Riggs at his deceased wives grave telling her he hasn't visited her in a while (evident from a weed growing over the grave) he then suddenly draws his gun when he hears a noise in the cemetery, the noise which turns out to be Leo Getz practising his PI techniques.Riggs' pager reveals that Lorna is having the baby and they hurry to the hospital.

The movie ends with Lorna and Martin's last-ditch marriage in the maternity ward, and Roger accepting Lee and Rianne's marriage. Two babies are born to Rianne and Lorna, as Martin Riggs is finally settling down. The Hong family is granted asylum. The end credits feature the song "Why Can't We Be Friends?" by "War " along with a collage of screen shots and snapshots taken during production from all four movies in the series.

Themes

Prominent in the story is the idea that Riggs is now feeling his age and has started echoing Murtaugh's standard line about getting "too old for this shit." Riggs and Murtaugh resist this idea and talk numerous times in the film about the power of their own will to bring them through. Riggs and Lorna also have a couple of conversations about getting married now that she is going to have his child. This sets up a conflict for Riggs as he has not fully achieved closure after the death of his wife, Vicki, years before.

This installment also continues the series' tradition of political statements being integrated into the story. The film takes a couple of noticeable jabs at the NRA and features dialogue concerning U.S. immigration attitudes and the problem of slavery both past and present. There are also some running jokes carried over from the previous movies such as Riggs' antagonistic relationship with the police psychiatrist played by Mary Ellen Trainor and Leo's tendency toward profanity-laced tirades.

Reaction

Although the film grossed $130 million domestically, it was not considered a runaway financial success as the previous three films had been. Although shooting began in January 1998, just months before the film's release, the film had a production budget in excess of $140 million along with related advertising expenses. This made the fourth movie the most expensive entry of the "Lethal Weapon" franchise. Its profit margin was saved in part due to the combined foreign box office sales making the film gross approximately $285 million in total. [http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=lethalweapon4.htm] Still, like its predecessors, "Lethal Weapon 4" was among the top 10 grossing movies of its release year.

The UK version is heavily edited by the BBFC, with 93 seconds removed due to violence. Ninety shots are removed in 38 separate cuts.

The film was received with mostly positive reviews.

Cast and production notes

Jackie Chan was initially offered the role of Wa Sing Ku, but he declined since he does not like to play villain roles and would later work on "Rush Hour". Instead, the film became Jet Li's American film debut. It is also the first film where Li plays the villain.

Mel Gibson was reluctant to revisit the franchise and was paid $25 million for the film. This is the first and only film in the franchise where his character's hair is cut shorter and he is not sporting his mullet hairstyle as he had in the previous three films. In reality, Mel Gibson abandoned this hairstyle in between "Lethal Weapon 3" and his 1994 film "Maverick".

After appearing in this film, Pesci announced that he was leaving acting in order to pursue his musical career and to enjoy life away from the camera. (Though in 2006, he would make a cameo appearance in the film "The Good Shepherd", which was directed by friend and fellow actor Robert De Niro.)

Larenz Tate, Will Smith and Chris Tucker turned down the role of Detective Butters, Tucker turned down the role as he was filming "Rush Hour" and did not want to play a similar character.

The freeway chase scene was filmed on an unopened section of Interstate 215 in Las Vegas, Nevada. Exit numbers (which were not installed on most California freeways until 2002) can be seen on highway signs during the pursuit.

Van Halen performed "Fire in the Hole" on the soundtrack (From the album "Van Halen III").

The film is unusual in that its scenes were shot in order. Although the opening scene was shot in January 1998, it was set in late 1997, assuming the rest of the movie took place in the summer of 1998.

Sequel?

There was talk of a "Lethal Weapon 5", where Richard Donner said "I have the story in my head for a fifth and final "Lethal Weapon", but it's all up to Mel Gibson." [http://www.movieweb.com/news/99/2099.php] Gibson, however, had no interest in continuing the series. In 2007, Moviehole.net received word from sources that Warner Bros. are in the early stages of trying to relaunch the "Lethal Weapon" series sometime in 2009 or later [http://www.moviehole.net/news/20070806_will_lethal_weapon_be_reloaded.html] .It has been announced that there are talks of a Lethal Weapon 5 according to Digiguide [http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/movies/a119937/gibson-glover-back-for-lethal-weapon-5.html]

References

* [http://www.worldwidedvdforums.com/kb.php?mode=article&k=27 Worldwide DVD Forums]
* [http://screenrant.com/lethal-weapon-5-niall-3333/ Lethal Weapon 5? - Screen Rant]

See also

* "Lethal Weapon"
* "Lethal Weapon 2"
* "Lethal Weapon 3"

External links

*

Box Office Leaders USA
before = Armageddon
date = July 12
year = 1998
after = The Mask of Zorro