Lethal Weapon: Director's Cut

Not actually a Director's Cut, as Richard Donner apparently didn't approve of the changes, Lethal Weapon's extended version has been available before but never in 4K. Included as part of the recent 4K UHD release there are enough differences to make the 'Director's Cut' worth discussing separately.

The first is that, even with seven or so additional minutes, it's still under two hours. There's an endless argument as to whether films are actually getting longer, but raiding the cutting room floor to improve the characterisation of its protagonists could potentially have made Lethal Weapon unwieldy. As it stands the only element truly overblown is Mel Gibson's locks, Martin Riggs undercover work might well be compromised by a bouffant sort-of-mullet that has a presence of its own on screen. One of the scenes added involves his character's dog, not the only shaggy thing on screen.

The majority of the additions are early, indeed they're before the two meet. That meeting still stands up, Gibson's charisma really sells his looking around for the threat when someone is shouting "gun!" in a crowded office, completely ignoring the (lovingly detailed) Beretta in his own hands. Before tackling the new guy, Danny Glover's Murtaugh is shown on the shooting range alone. Another reminder that he's also a Vietnam veteran, that his stability is in part based on the anchors that Riggs has lost. A scene where Riggs challenges a school shooter is disturbingly relevant even with 40 years of distance. It was cut from the original theatrical release in part because it's one of several introductory scenes for Riggs. Its restoration does really hammer home a pattern of behaviour. Even with the knowledge that we're minutes into a film that'll have three sequels and a TV-remake there's a sense of danger, another part of Lethal Weapon's difficult balancing act.

This was writer Shane Black's début feature, and hallmarks of his later career are everywhere. Set at Christmas, jokey in its tone, and building to action set-pieces there's no shortage of pieces that his other work will feature. That includes, oddly, a helicopter attack on a beachfront house. Director Richard Donner was already a veteran with a number of deeply odd odd-couple pictures under his belt, rat-pack adjacent nightclub spy-caper Salt And Pepper and a picture that defies easy summary called Lola (or Twinky, depending). Fresh from the success of Goonies this also draws from a variety of comic traditions.

The bantering back and forth between Riggs and Murtaugh would carry three more films, but from the off there's something between Glover and Gibson that's captivating. In the clarity of recent 4K re-master their ostensible age difference is ironically blurrier. Glover (then 38) was playing 50, Gibson (then 30) was playing 37. It'd have been entirely possible for the younger man to have been adjacent to CIA operations in Laos as recently as 1974. US audiences would have been most familiar with him from Mad Max and its sequels so the notion that he'd been a deadly fighter across the globe wouldn't be a stretch. The ostensible age-gap is made murkier by some of Riggs' desperation. Dead wives as motivation isn't much new, but a loneliness that manifests as picking up a streetwalker to watch a television broadcast of the three Stooges has a very particular desperation to it.

With this much distance there are intriguing directions not taken in Lethal Weapon, not least that our buddy cops were both soldiers, and at either end of the spread of Vietnam servicemen. The title's Lethal Weapon, not anything relating to swords or ploughshares but the notion that law enforcement might represent a path to demilitarisation (especially in Los Angeles!) now seems charmingly quaint. Vietnam's known by some as "the helicopter war" Donner's fondness for them is seen again and again. The opening shot is a ludicrous bit of Eighties choreography, a long aerial shot across the dusky LA skyline that ends in a close up on a young woman's cleavage. There are aerial shots that make in-car banter significantly more interesting (and much more expensive) and two of the action set-pieces featuring helicopters have them both being shot at and shot from.

There's a just-visible version of Lethal Weapon where the defining image of what'll become a franchise is not Danny Glover muttering that he's "too old for this shit" but as a cop and a father staring down a military-industrial criminal-convoy approaching through the ripple of heat-haze. Humour is usually cheaper than hardware though, and Lethal Weapon has it in bulk. It's also got an astonishing Eighties score provided by Michael Kamen who presumably got another quantity-based discount on synths and saxophones. Listen out for the guitar part of Riggs' theme, by the way, as it's provided by Eric Clapton.

As someone whose experience of Lethal Weapon is as a film that was once on television a reappraisal isn't necessary but has been interesting. The director's cut (that sort of isn't) isn't the only place where there are scenes I hadn't seen before. Watching it as a kid in the states a debate about the relative merits of marijuana and beer (but not the driving afterwards!) was cut. Watching it as a teen back in the UK parts of the torture scenes weren't left hanging around. The roster of baddies is full of 'that guys', starting with the General (Mitchell Ryan). Gary Busey has rarely been as menacing, his Mister Joshua if anything a more composed reflection of Riggs. Even his lighter moments are disturbing.

Part of the appeal of Lethal Weapon is from what would happen afterwards. It's a foundational text. It wasn't the first buddy cop or odd-couple movie, but it was an astonishing commercial success and so became prototypical for a genre. Call it "the odd-couple", despite there having been examples more than 48 Hrs beforehand. Its tone would inform a legion of imitators too, starting an arms-race for one-liners around ironic dispatches. There's a reference within this to Air America, and that would be part of Gibson's late eighties run of this sort of film that'd make him a US superstar. This wasn't his first non-Australian film by any stretch, but made more of an impact than fare like Mrs Soffel or (despite its quality) The Year Of Living Dangerously.

The plot is brought about by ties of camaraderie and fatherhood, and despite potential detours remains straightforward. Whatever lofty motivations might be possible it defaults to ruthlessness and revenge. Its straightforwardness is, in truth, another part of the appeal. Classic combinations like meat and potatoes get the job done, but no matter how workmanlike everything around them is, Gibson and Glover are what make the magic.

Reviewed on: 29 Jun 2025