Stars: Mel Gibson, Danny Glover, Joe Pesci
Year: 1992
Director: Richard Donner
“The Magic Is Back Again!”
The film starts off with a scene built for, and in traditional Lethal Weapon style. There’s a giant bomb in the back of a car located in the basement of a building. Roger wants to wait for bomb squad, but we all know that bomb-squad is for pussies. If I ran a police station, I wouldn’t even have a bomb squad. Naturally, Riggs wants to go in there and get his hands dirty, and accidentally clips the wrong wire. The building is leveled and they’re busted back down to patrol officers.
It turns out to be a good thing, as they witness an armored car being robbed, and this ends up blowing a different case wide open. As it appears, a former cop is stealing guns & armor piercing bullets that are ready for destruction. The said cop is a pretty bad-ass dude who has no problems with sealing a guy in cement, and waltzing into a police station and shooting a suspect. He’s also probably one of those bad-asses, such as myself, who laugh when other dudes talk about “getting boners”. Because guys like us, got a boner once, and that was it. It’s never gone away, baby.
IA, Internal Affairs has been brought in due to the police involvement. The agent they’ve sent is Lorna Cole [Rene Russo], and she isn’t cow-towing to Riggs’ bullshit. While at a burger stand, Riggs notices some suspicious lookin’ dudes and decides to check it out. Upon flashing his badge, he gets a clip dumped at him, and a 2×4 upside his head. Murtaugh rushes to his aide, and gets the same automatic gunfire treatment as Riggs, although he isn’t knocked out cold and is able to open fire. The kid he puts down ends up being one of his son’s friends, and he doesn’t take it to well. Opting to avoid going home, by getting loaded on his boat instead.
Now, with Murtaugh pouting, Riggs is left to figure out what’s going on with Lorna, and IA. They eventually decide to quit fucking around with each other, and share info. This leads them to a building that’s housing a good amount of the stolen guns. Riggs get’s held at gun point, while Lorna proves she’s a bad-ass by kicking the merciful crap out of a ton of dudes. They hop in a pick-up truck and make off with all the goods. Now, how do you celebrate such a victory? By boning, of course. Often times I’ve had women superiors want to celebrate a job-well done by boning. Problem is, any time they have sex with me, the 10-15 seconds is a job well done, so they want to do it again. It’s like the song that never ends, you know? Anyways, Riggs forces Roger to quit feeling sorry for himself, and the three of them are now out for blood, beating up and threatening any lead they can to get to Jack Travis.
Success is achieved as they track down Jack Travis’ little HQ, a housing development that’s, well, in development. There’s a pretty good shoot out, followed by explosions, and Riggs shooting a dude through a bulldozer scoop with a clip of armor piercing bullets. Well, at least one knows what to do should Bob The Builder ever lose his shit.
Man Movie Encyclopedia Tally:
1-Liners: 5
Guys Beat Up: 12
Guys Killed: 15
Swear Words: 128
Boobs: None
Explosions: 3
Slow-Motion Scenes: 26
Car Chases: 2
Chases on Foot: 3
Broken Bones: 1
Fight at a Motel? None
Guy Get Girl? Yes
Guy Smoke Cigarettes? None
1-Liners:
[a guy is knocked-out due to Riggs, and is handcuffed to the grill of the armor truck he was stealing]
Riggs: You have the right to remain unconscious
[entering Jack Travis’ construction site]
Murtaugh: Let’s foreclose on this son of a bitch
[Riggs is about to get run over by Jack Travis in a tractor]
Murtaugh: Riggs! [tosses him an uzi] Cop killers!
[Riggs blast through the tractor-bucket, hitting Travis]
Riggs: Ex-Cop killers.
[Travis is barely alive, and tells Riggs to go to hell. Riggs puts the tractor in gear, sending it into a burning house]
Riggs: You first
Man-Facts:
Murtaugh’s boat is called Code 7. I looked it up, and it means “meal break”.
The building that’s blown up in the beginning is the former City Hall for Orlando, Florida.
In the original script, Leo Getz had left LA for New York. All his scenes were just dropped in around the events of the finalized script.
Jack Travis’ housing site wasn’t built for the film. The developers went broke before they finished the project. The crew got the rights to film there so long as they tore it down after the shoot. I assume that’s why they felt the need to burn it down. Hell, I would have written a scene where most of the main actors decide to really get back at Travis by tearing down the site, and then cleaning it all up.
It’s the highest grossing of the series.
Box-Office Business:
Released by Warners, and created for $35 million, it opened May 15th, 1992, to 2,510 theaters. It opened up at #1 for the weekend, bringing in $33,243,086
In the end, it brought in a cool $321,731,527
C’mon Bennet, Let’s Party:
I have no problem in saying that Lethal Weapon 3 is my least favorite entry in the series. Still, Lethal Weapon on it’s worst day is still better than most on their best day. There was a lot to like about it, but I just didn’t vibe with the whole Roger-shooting-the-teen-and-lamenting-about-it angle. I felt like it dragged the film down, honestly. I dug Jack Travis, he was a cool villain, and I felt a fine foil for the team. Rene Russo was a fine addition, because she wasn’t just a girl there to bang Riggs, she also kicked ass. I also thought having Leo die his hair blonde and spike it was one of those small changes that worked perfectly. It really played to his whole “trying to be big time” kinda deal.
4 & 1/4th Head-Butts Out Of 5
