The Best and Worst of Martin Lawrence

“The Best and Worst of” series chronicles the career highlights and lowlights of an actor starring in one of the week's new theatrical releases. This week, I take a look at the filmography of “Bad Boys for Life” star Martin Lawrence.

Films starring Martin Lawrence that I've seen:
Do the Right Thing
Bad Boys
Blue Streak
Big Momma's House
Black Knight
National Security
Bad Boys II
Big Momma's House 2
Wild Hogs
Welcome Home Roscoe Jenkins
Death at a Funeral
Big Mommas: Like Father, Like Son
The Beach Bum

Best Performance: The Beach Bum (2019)
Lawrence couldn't have possibly orchestrated a better big screen comeback than this. Harmony Korine basically just Lawrence run wild as a zany dolphin tour guide named Captain Wack who may or may not have a stunning lack of knowledge about the species he loves so much and the results were absolutely priceless. By completely embracing the combination of enthusiasm and recklessness that drives this preposterous character, Lawrence provides this abstract stoner comedy with its most uproarious 10 minutes of material.

Worst Performance: Big Mommas: Like Father, Like Son (2011)
Boy is it a blessing that Lawrence returned to acting because it would've been downright depressing if Big Mommas: Like Father, Like Son ended up being his last big screen credit. His third go-round as an FBI agent who is somehow forced to pose as an obese elderly woman every time he's involved in an undercover operation was a low effort piece of work that nicely complements the monumentally unfunny jokes that occupy 100% of the runtime.

Best Film: Do the Right Thing (1989)
Spike Lee's debut is a stone cold masterpiece that reaches heights that he's yet to achieve since. Watching this film slowly morph from a breezy, vibrant comedy about the residents of a Brooklyn neighborhood on a brutally hot summer day to a devastatingly visceral depiction of race relations and police brutality made this is a distinctly haunting watch that I'll never forget.

Worst Film: Big Mommas: Like Father, Like Son (2011)
You won't get a lot of strong takes from me surrounding the Big Momma House's franchise. They were just silly, somewhat tasteless comedies that were the product of an era where male comedians wearing fatsuits got asses in the seats. After seeing Big Mommas: Like Father, Like Son at the age of 20, I almost felt compelled to hail the previous two films as classics. The attempts at comedy here are so embarrassingly lazy and weak that it turns into a joyless, infuriating marathon of pain by the 15 minute mark.

Thank you for reading this week's edition of “The Best and Worst of”. The next victim of my praise and ire will be “The Gentlemen” star Jeremy Strong.