The “buddy cop” movie is a staple of action cinema. Movies about mismatched cops present actors with opportunities to show off their chemistry and give writers a chance to break up action sequences with some bickering between the characters. The gold standard for this well-worn subgenre is Richard Donner’s 1987 neo-noir action thriller Lethal Weapon, the tale of unstable young renegade cop Martin Riggs (Mel Gibson) teaming up with by-the-book detective Roger Murtaugh (Danny Glover), an old coot on the brink of retirement.
Several other buddy cop movies have come close to toppling it. So, here are 10 Buddy Cop Movies To Watch If You Like Lethal Weapon.
Bad Boys II
“This s**t just got real.” While the first Bad Boys movie introduced us to carefree bachelor Mike Lowrey (Will Smith) and family man Marcus Burnett (Martin Lawrence), the second one ratcheted up the insanity with a nine-digit budget, a mega-sized set piece every few minutes, and gags about taking a gunshot to the butt.
Smith and Lawrence’s on-screen chemistry is fantastic, keeping you hooked even as the plot about an ecstasy ring in Miami becomes unbelievable and ludicrous, while the movie has countless quotable one-liners. Bad Boys II borders on self-parody, but there’s also a sincerity in the acting and in Michael Bay’s direction.
The Other Guys
When Adam McKay and Will Ferrell set out to parody buddy cop movies with The Other Guys, they also created a pretty great example of one – albeit with their uniquely absurdist sense of humor. Ferrell plays a police accountant stuck behind a desk (and thrilled about it), while Mark Wahlberg provides the perfect comic foil as a disgraced cop who was confined to a desk after accidentally shooting Derek Jeter and desperately wants to get back out in the field.
As they stumble upon a widespread financial crime – this is where the movie becomes a satire of the 2008 banking crisis – they’re drawn deeper into the world of violent interrogations, car chases, and shootouts.
Turner & Hooch
Turner & Hooch isn’t like most buddy cop movies, in that the mismatched leads aren’t both humans. Tom Hanks plays a cop who is paired up with a dog named Hooch after Hooch is the only witness to the crime that Hanks is trying to solve.
Dog lovers probably won’t appreciate the fact that Hanks’ character isn’t a dog person, but that works in the story’s favor. Movies are boring without conflict, and the conflict here is that a cop who doesn’t really like a dog is forced to work with one. And of course, throughout the movie, he becomes endeared to Hooch.
Beverly Hills Cop
Beverly Hills Cop is one of the few action comedies that actually succeed as both an action movie and a comedy movie, and the latter is mostly thanks to Eddie Murphy’s incredible lead performance as Axel Foley. He’s a Detroit cop who constantly irks his captain, eventually being forced to take a sabbatical.
After Axel’s best friend is killed, he decides to spend his sabbatical tracking down the killer, which leads him to Beverly Hills. Judge Reinhold and John Ashton play a couple of stuffed-shirt local cops who are sent on Axel’s trail when he starts making trouble on the streets of Beverly Hills.
Die Hard with a Vengeance
The third movie in the Die Hard franchise, Die Hard with a Vengeance, was initially developed as an original story called Simon Says. Then, it was retooled as a potential Lethal Weapon sequel, before finding its place as a Die Hard movie. The Die Hard movies usually find Bruce Willis’ John McClane character as a lone wolf, crawling through air vents or climbing up elevator shafts to evade terrorists.
In Die Hard with a Vengeance, he was given a partner in the form of Zeus Carver, played by Samuel L. Jackson. Together, they chase a terrorist around New York, answering riddles to defuse bombs.
The Nice Guys
Written and directed by Shane Black, the creator of the Lethal Weapon franchise, The Nice Guys could’ve launched a new series of action-packed buddy cop films if it wasn’t buried at the box office by Captain America: Civil War and Me Before You.
Ryan Gosling and Russell Crowe star as a pair of private eyes in the ‘70s who reluctantly agree to work together when they find themselves drawn to the same case. Gosling and Crowe have hilarious banter throughout the movie, the action sequences are exciting (tinged with slick neo-noir visuals), and there’s a little political commentary sprinkled in there for good measure.
Hot Fuzz
Edgar Wright, Simon Pegg, and Nick Frost brought the buddy cop genre to the English countryside with Hot Fuzz, their action-packed follow-up to Shaun of the Dead. After crafting a great zombie movie in addition to paying homage to the genre, the trio did the same with the buddy cop movie. Pegg plays Nicholas Angel, a big-city cop whose arrest record is so good that he’s transferred to a sleepy village to stop making the other cops in London look bad.
There, he finds that something sinister is going on with the high accident rate and the low crime rate, and investigates with local cop Danny Butterman, played by Frost, culminating in an epic showdown.
Midnight Run
Neither of the lead characters in Midnight Run are technically cops, but it does have all the elements of a buddy cop movie. Robert De Niro plays a bounty hunter who is bringing in a fugitive to make a big score. Charles Grodin plays the fugitive, a mild-mannered mob accountant, who insists he didn’t do anything wrong.
As the feds, the mob, and a league of fellow bounty hunters chase them down, De Niro struggles to get Grodin across the country with Planes, Trains, and Automobiles-level travel setbacks, all while Grodin is continually trying to escape. Throughout the film, their back-and-forth develops and they reluctantly become close friends.
Point Break
Although its premise is a little absurd, Point Break survives on the spectacular chemistry shared by Keanu Reeves and Patrick Swayze, and the intense, cinematic set-pieces devised by visionary director Kathryn Bigelow. Reeves plays Johnny Utah, an ex-NFL player whose injuries forced him to take a job at the FBI, who is sent undercover with a gang of bank robbers who surf in their spare time.
Swayze plays Bodhi, the spiritual leader of the gang – the role he was born to play. The two develop such a strong bond throughout the investigation that Utah eventually doesn’t want to turn in Bodhi, creating an interesting character dynamic.
48 Hrs.
Before Lethal Weapon would solidify the tropes of the buddy cop movie, 48 Hrs. created the genre. Nick Nolte plays a grizzled cop, working on a case, who is forced to let the perp’s old partner-in-crime, a streetwise crook played by Eddie Murphy, out of jail for 48 hours to help him.
Nolte and Murphy are perfectly matched, with the latter bringing an unparalleled comic energy to his first starring role and the former acting as the “straight man” of the duo. 48 Hrs. has a healthy balance of action and humor, its lead actors have impeccable chemistry, and it moves along at a breakneck pace – it’s a perfect buddy cop movie.
