As the sneak preview audience struggles to figure out how to get back the hour and a half Martin Lawrence and Steve Zahn stole from them Wednesday during the screening of their new movie “National Security,” let’s try to remember the good parts.
Wait a minute … nope, nothing.
Those remarks may be a bit harsh, but expecting a small amount of originality and creative thought to be present in a film isn’t asking too much. That lack of a solid plot may be Lawrence’s strength. With no storyline to get in the way, the audience can focus on his obnoxious racial slurs. Nobody in that theater was expecting to see an Oscar-worthy performance — we are talking about Martin Lawrence, the man who brought us such classics as “Big Momma’s House” and “Black Knight.” Keeping expectations low is the key to enjoying this film.
The funniest aspect of the movie was Zahn’s manipulation of his oversized mustache as he reacted to Lawrence’s jokes, borrowed from “Bad Boys” — or was that “Blue Streak”?
Zahn plays Hank, a cop who watches his partner gunned down in the line of duty and wants nothing more than to bust the sleaze who did it. Lawrence is Earl, a police cadet whose tactics involve a few too many explosions and mayhem for the academy, and is therefore dismissed. This is apparently because he is black, as he points out unmercifully throughout the entire film.
Through a cruel twist of fate, the two encounter one another and a Rodney King-like sequence ensues as Hank attempts to swat a bee away from Earl with his baton. Earl testifies and Hank is thrown in prison. Hank loses his job, his wife, his freedom and is forced to take a security job after his release.
Coincidentally, Earl is also now a security guard and the two team up to bring down some crooked cops, earning the right to rejoin the L.A. police department. It would be assumed that after such a horrible experience one would try and avoid the person responsible for ruining his life. But that wouldn’t make for good comedy.
From a rain-soaked police funeral to a “Dukes of Hazzard”-style car chase to one-liners that should be no-liners, this movie is one, big predictable cliché. Lawrence and Zahn are funny guys, but the only laughing the audience will do is at how bad the movie really is and not at the jokes. This movie may be the movie to end Lawrence’s career.
