'Play Dirty' Review: Mark Wahlberg in Entertaining Retro Action Comedy

There are few genres I like less than the snarky violent action comedy. I didn’t care for it much in the ’80s (though “48 HRS.” is splendid popcorn), I liked it even less in the ’90s (though occasionally I would see something like “The Last Boy Scout” or “Rush Hour” that packed a disreputable wallop), and now that the genre has mostly been taken over by the streamers, it seems to have entered its weirdly postmodern and annoying convoluted cookie-cutter phase. But “ Play Dirty ,” directed and co-written by Shane Black (who wrote “Lethal Weapon” and the famously expensive script for “The Last Boy Scout”), is an action-comedy throwback powered by enough casual violence to inspire more grins and groans. Black, over the years, has made this retro action power cheese his brand, not always su