By The Butcher
You love ’em, he hates ’em! The Butcher carves up your favourite films, and this week, he applies his sharpened cleaver to 1987’s’ action classic Lethal Weapon starring Mel Gibson and Danny Glover.
Ah, yes, Mel Gibson. The one-time most hated man in Hollywood. One of the lowest human beings on the planet. Sure, boxer and occasional “actor”, Mike Tyson – a convicted rapist, for fuck sake! – can still cameo in The Hangover, and director, Victor Salva – a friggin’ child molester! – can still make movies, but ol’ Mel Columcille Gerard Gibson was for quite some time a villain of Darth Vader-level proportions.
Grubby, dirty ol’ Harvey Weinstein – for a long time the guy everyone sucked up to…even Kevin Smith called his production company The Harvey Boys – is now The Great Hollywood Villain, but for a while there, it was “Australia’s own” (though many in Oz were happy to refer to him as “American-born” once again after his various indiscretions) Mel Gibson. But despite his history as a drunken, cop-abusing, Jew-offending, wife-insulting, strangely religious oddball, Mel has apparently – in the shitty, New Age, American-central parlance – “owned” his bad behaviour.
“I disgraced myself and my family, and for that I am truly sorry,” Gibbo said after one of his wayward moral wobbles. “I have battled with the disease of alcoholism for all of my adult life, and profoundly regret my horrific relapse.” That’s usually enough to earn forgiveness, but not for poor ol’ Gibbo, who’s been metaphorically adorned with a permanent set of devil horns, cut asunder and left to appear in low-key indie productions and minor studio flicks. Though considering his stance on Jewish folk, those of the hard political left may now be ready to re-embrace Mad Mel! It might be time for a comeback!
Anyway, at this point in proceedings, The Butcher would like to make something very clear: I hated Mel Gibson way before everyone else did. I hated him before it was popular, and I hate his “old stuff” just as much as his “new stuff.” I hate Mad Max, I hate Braveheart, I hate Gallipoli, and I even hate Tim. But I especially hate Lethal Weapon.
Apart from Mel Gibson’s mullet, this film has nothing going for it. The plot feels like it’s been lifted from an episode of Starsky & Hutch, there’s no chemistry between Gibbo and Danny Glover, the main bad guy is the tragic Gary Busey, and Gibbo’s acting is profoundly awful, even though he believes the Lethal Weapon films contain his “favourite performances. It sounds really crummy, I know, but although the work doesn’t look hard, it’s difficult to create effortless on screen.”
Effortless? There’s nothing effortless about Gibbo’s sub-Three Stooges face-pulling and absurd over-acting. It might have worked for The Keystone Cops, but as an LA detective, he’s just a joke. Lethal Weapon is exactly that: a bomb of massive proportions. Yes, all of you pathetic bandwagon-jumping, headline-following sheep hate Mel Gibson now, but you should have hated him just as much fifty years ago…
Want to read more from The Butcher? Check out his angry missives against Blazing Saddles, Strictly Ballroom, Donnie Darko, Psycho, 12 Years A Slave, Red Dog, The Wolf Of Wall Street, Breathless, Elizabeth, Miracle On 34th Street, The Full Monty, There Will Be Blood, Les Miserables, The King’s Speech, Picnic At Hanging Rock, The Magnificent Seven, Gone With The Wind, The Right Stuff, 81/2, Pulp Fiction, Easy Rider, The Shawshank Redemption, 2001: A Space Odyssey, The Wizard Of Oz, Jaws, Black Swan, Gladiator, Chopper, I’m Not There, Interstellar, Marvel Studios and Citizen Kane.
