Joe Pantoliano

CHICAGO –“Bad Boys: Ride Or Die,” the fourth in this series, is a big budget clunker that’s clearing coasting on fumes. A wheezy Martin Lawrence, and a post-slap Will Smith, are trying to recapture some of their former box office glory by trying to milk their still considerable chemistry for all its worth. The best that can be said is that it’s less of an interminable slog than I thought it would be.

CHICAGO – “Bad Boys For Life” shows that maybe Will Smith isn’t too old for this kind of sh*t, but Martin Lawrence certainly is. This third installment comes 17 years after “Bad Boys II,” and 25 years after the original film unleashed director Michael Bay on an unsuspecting public.

CHICAGO – Now’s the time that a lesser writer would make some plot-related pun related to ask if you remember “Memento,” one of the best films of the ’00s that also happens to feature a protagonist suffering from memory loss. One thing fans of writer/director Christopher Nolan would like to forget is how cruel the Academy has been to their favorite filmmaker over the last decade, failing to nominate him yet for Best Director and never giving him an Oscar. For shame.

Blu-Ray Rating: 5.0/5.0

CHICAGO – Like a lot of movie fans, one of the first DVDs I owned in the early days of the technology was the revolutionary “The Matrix,” starring Keanu Reeves, Laurence Fishburne, Carrie-Anne Moss, and Joe Pantoliano from directors Andy and Larry Wachowski. Not only was this sci-fi action extravaganza an easily re-watchable film but it looked amazing with DVD quality. Of course, HD was developed for movies like “The Matrix,” now available as a stand-alone Blu-Ray release for the first time.