After seeing Blue Streak, starring Martin Lawrence and directed by Les Mayfield, I went and looked at the list of movies Lawrence has been in, in the past. My hunch was correct. The best from that list involved him with another strong actor in co-leading roles. Life with Eddie Murphy. Bad Boys with Will Smith. Maybe it is just Blue Streak or perhaps it is that Lawrence is best suited to be part of a duo rather than a sole leading man. Whether or not it is his fault, Lawrence didn't carry Blue Streak and it isn't anywhere near as good a movie as it could have been.

The concept is very strong. A jewel thief, in the middle of stealing a diamond worth 17 million dollars is forced to abandon his loot in a building under construction. He notes the location of the building, planning to return when he gets out of jail. But when he is finally freed, two years later, the building where his diamond waits is now a police station. So he's forced to impersonate a cop in order to get inside and look around for what he has waited for.

One of the problems is that we're never sure where Blue Streak is going. If it is supposed to be a comedy, the laughs are too few and some are completely contrived. As a drama, it stops too often for those forced laughs to work.

Because Lawrence was a very good thief, he knows what crooks will do and this makes him a very good cop, when he's forced to continue his impersonation long past the originally intended time. But there are just too many places where the action sags, where he engages in what is just too hard to believe would ever pass even a moment's scrutiny and the subplot involving one of the other thieves from the original heist wanting the diamond all for himself is weak at best.

Lawrence has good moments in the movie. There are funny moments and strong dramatic moments as well. But there just aren't enough of them woven together to create the kind of strong tension that makes a movie work for me.