Comedian Chris Rock injects a lot of good humor into the film with his portrayal of Lee Butters, a young detective who always seems to be under Murtaugh's foot. As always, the stunt work in this forth installment is outstanding. Hand to hand fighting in this film is exemplary, thanks to the appearance of Hong Kong action star Jet Li whose martial arts prowess is extraordinary. Hopefully, we will be seeing Li in more American action films. The two-sided DVD features a Letterboxed presentation on one side and the supplemental features on the other.
Colors are vibrant and the DVD reproduces the well-saturated hues without a bit of chroma noise.
MPEG-2 artifacts were never bothersome thanks to a terrific compression job. The Dolby Digital 5.1 channel soundtrack is a blast- another demo disc for action movie fans. All of the discrete channels are used to ping pong the directional effects, while the clear sounding dialogue remained strongly focused in the center. Bass reproduction was solid, which helped drive the film's explosions and gunfire right at the viewer. A French 5.1 channel soundtrack has also been provided, as have English and French subtitles.