We review “Dolittle,” the latest adaptation of Hugh Lofting’s fairy tale, starring Robert Downey Jr.; “Bad Boys for Life,” with Will Smith and Martin Lawrence returning for the third time as the Miami detective duo; “A Fall From Grace,” a Tyler Perry thriller premiering on Netflix today.
Our critics: Dave White, critic for The Wrap and co-host of Linoleum Knife; and Christy Lemire, writer for RogerEbert.com and co-host of Breakfast All Day.
“Dolittle”
Dave White: “Robert Downey Jr. is weirdly detached from everything around him. I think he just did all of his parts in a solitary room in front of a green screen and is not interacting with any other real human being in the film. That’s what it feels like.”
Christy Lemire: “Supposedly this thing cost $175 million to make. [There’s an] embarrassment of riches both behind and in front of the camera … besides Robert Downey Jr., who I don’t know why this is the thing he wants to use all his ‘Avengers’ clout for, you have Michael Sheen, you have Jim Broadbent. … And then behind the scenes doing the voices of the animals: Octavia Spencer, Emma Thompson, Rami Malek, Tom Holland, Marion Cotillard. What were they saying yes to?
… It’s baffling. I don’t know what I’ve seen. I’ve talked about this with a lot of people and I still don’t understand it.”
“Bad Boys for Life”
Christy Lemire: “The plot does not matter. It’s about getting these two guys together again and watching them bounce off of each other.”
Dave White says it’s a good thing that Michael Bay isn’t directing this time. “This is the most coherently put together ‘Bad Boys’ movie of the three. This is more sort of pedestrian as a film. You know what every beat is going to be next. And you know that if they are in a car and they look in the rearview mirror, you’re not going to see the ocean and a boat following them, which is what would’ve happened in a Michael Bay movie."
“A Fall From Grace”
Christy Lemire: “This is actually very competently made, given that this is a Tyler Perry movie. It is slicker than you would expect, but it’s still nuts. It gets increasingly nuts. I don’t want to give anything away.”