Whoever thought this was a good idea needed to get their head examined. Bubba Smith was great in the Police Academy movies, but here he has to emote and be an action hero. You can tell his knees are shot because he has trouble moving around properly and he has a strange insistence on wearing his socks over his pants and pulled up to his knees. You're supposed to feel his pain at having his girlfriend and cat murdered, but he's not exactly Brando and you're left with a whole bunch of nothing. Then there's Lloyd Bridges, who's supposed to be an evil racist, but spends most of the movie playing toys with his grandson. Look, if you want him to come across as a villain, you maybe don't want to show him playing with a toddler and making the kid laugh? Maybe have him torture someone? Sure he orders things, but it's always a brief moment between playing with the kid. Beau Bridges is supposed to be the by the book FBI agent, but he spends the whole movie ditching Bubba and getting beat up. The only saving grace of this movie was the fact that they used a tank at the end. And also the visual of Bubba Smith on a teeny pizza delivery scooter.

Any movie with Bubba Smith has to be, at the very least, entertaining. This movie is great if you are in a silly mood. Beau Bridges is a pretty awful actor, and Bubba Smith, fresh from his Police Academy days, is no Laurence Olivier. But, you dont rent this movie for that reason. It is a silly, 80's cop caper where there is a joke at least every ten minutes about Bubba Smith's height and strength (he either punches someone out or cannot fit into a care, etc). But, there is an interesting twist with a cat that has yet to be duplicated in any movie I have seen. In any event, you know what you are getting into when you are looking at Beau and Bubba movies and this one is no different. I say rent it, but make sure to rent another movie in the process.

Between the period when B movies were in theaters and the direct-to-video days of now, there were a number of movies like this made that should have gone direct to video. I can't imagine people enjoying this in theaters in 1987 - even if it had been released in 1977, audiences would have found it flat both in the action and humor departments. There's nothing here that you haven't seen before, so don't shed a tear if you go through life not watching it. The only thing of exception to write about is a mean-spirited tone that occasionally pops up, mostly in the scenes when Bubba's character kills defenseless villains.

At first, THE WILD PAIR was going to be another in a series of plain vanilla 80s action movies with a top billed cast of popular actors. This one had a little more than I once thought realized. Bubba "Hightower" Smith is still the powerfully brawny, yet funny character that best described him. He's too strong to be cast in an action film as he beats up and shoves criminals too easily with tremendous power, but he does manage to pull off some interesting humor along the way, and he later becomes vulnerable to violent attacks near the end. Smith's move to an action thriller was a good change of pace from the POLICE ACADEMY series, and he does show potential. The father and son duo of Beau & Lloyd Bridges display opposite sides against each other, but remember that B. Bridges and Smith are cops. There are some satisfying action thrills as well as the comedy. It's fairly close to LETHAL WEAPON in a low-end kind of fashion. Just try it.