Where to watch Loaded Weapon 1
2 1/2 Stars
In the wake of his former partner’s gruesome murder, the experienced LAPD Detective, Wes Luger, finds himself following a faint trail of crumbs, in the last, and most important, case of his career. Now, to catch the elusive killer, Wes reluctantly teams up with Jack Colt, a grieving loner and loose cannon, and no movie franchise is safe–including Lethal Weapon (1987), Dirty Harry (1971), Die Hard (1988), and The Silence of the Lambs (1991). Before long, the seductively cryptic owner of the Wilderness Girls Cookie factory, Miss Demeanor, becomes embroiled in a dangerous criminal conspiracy orchestrated by the nefarious Vietnam War veteran, General Mortars, and the bullets start flying. Can the mismatched duo thwart ruthless Mortars’ master plan? Do they deserve a sequel?
The Spoof genre and the Lethal Weapon franchise both peaked in popularity at the same time, so it was a likely inevitability that National Lampoon would target the popular action/comedy series. After Charlie Sheen successfully mocked Top Gun in the box-office hit Hot Shots, his brother, Emilio, would give it a try, aping Gibson in this sporadically funny but tame comedy that is of note mainly due to the curiosity of seeing a pre-Pulp Fiction Samuel L. Jackson in a goofy role. The high energy of the early scenes gives way to a muted and less successful mid-section, which becomes too bogged down in its throwaway storyline and forgets to include the rapid-fire jokes necessary to maintain comedic momentum.
Loaded Weapon 1 has a few great jokes and visual gags, but those are spread out over the course of 90 minutes. For this type of film to be successful, it requires dozens of these. To their credit, the writers have mined the territory well, and their lampooning of action-genre tropes is amusing; the music is particularly spot-on, while the actors do their best to deliver offbeat lines with a straight face. While it’s certainly not a classic along the lines of the ‘Naked Gun’ or ‘Airplane,’ Loaded Weapon 1 is better than the latter-year, 1997-2010, Leslie Nielsen spoof movies.
Directed by: Gene Quintano
Written by: Don Holley, Tori Tellem, Gene Quintano
Starring: Emilio Estevez, Samuel L. Jackson, Jon Lovitz