MORE THAN SKIN-DEEP; THE REASONS (AND REWARDS) BEHIND HOLLYWOOD'S INTERRACIAL BUDDY-MOVIE PAIRINGS.

Byline: Bob Strauss Daily News Film Writer

One positive thing that can be said for the recent crop of Hollywood movies: Many of the buddy comedies and action flicks offer convincing evidence that we can, indeed, all get along.

Under often felonious and generally violent circumstances, maybe, but in mutually respectful and even affectionate terms by the end.

Buddy movies pairing African-Americans and whites have long been a safe commercial bet, and at the moment they're more successful than ever.

``Nothing to Lose'' opens in theaters today. It's the latest in a long line of action comedies that date back to at least the original ``48 HRS.'' (1982), in which a white guy (in this case Tim Robbins) and an African-American guy (Martin Lawrence) with nothing in common meet, squabble, survive hair-raising adventures and wind up fast if unlikely friends.

Meanwhile, ``Men in Black,'' the sci-fi comedy starring Tommy Lee Jones and Will Smith as immigration agents targeting extraterrestrials, is doing record box-office business and in less than three weeks has become a pop-culture phenomenon.

In the near future, we'll see Charlie Sheen and ``The Fifth Element's'' Chris Tucker in ``Money Talks.'' There's a ``Mod Squad'' movie, based on the interracial cop show of the 1960s, in the works. And it was recently reported that Mel Gibson, long loathe to make a fourth ``Lethal Weapon'' police action picture, has finally agreed to once again play the crazy white cop opposite Danny Glover's long-suffering, stable family man.

Successful formula

Of course, there are good commercial reasons why these movies keep getting made. Primary is that they tend to make money because their casting appeals to two big moviegoing demographics - and especially to the young men of both races who are the nation's most motivated ticket-buyers. Even a wretched comedy like the recent ``Gone Fishin','' starring Glover and ``Lethal'' supporting actor Joe Pesci, found enough of an audience to register among the top five moneymakers through most of the month of June.

But giving a wide range of people someone to identify with on screen is only part of the appeal. The fact that the heroes, at least on an interpersonal level, tend to overcome the ethnic divides that have been so agonizingly difficult to bridge in the real world is an uplifting form of wish fulfillment. Brutal and coarse as they often are, these films all speak to our highest ideals of a colorblind and classless society.

It's intrinsic to these escapist entertainments that they don't take ethnic conflicts seriously. Victim mentalities and liberal guilt, so pervasive in Hollywood's ``serious'' social issue cinema, is scant to nonexistent. If anything, these kinds of buddy films set up their co-stars as pretty much equal in the qualities that count - their tough-guy attitudes, problem-solving skills, ability to overcome prejudice and verbal wit - regardless of any differences in social standing, income or criminal record.

Cinematic barometer

Actually, by not getting all solemn or indignant, these films' takes on the racial issues that divide America run a remarkable gamut - one that, all things considered, could reflect the diversity of Americans' opinions on the subject more accurately than a Spike Lee manifesto or a Rob Reiner integration drama.

Some, like the ``Lethal Weapons'' and ``MiB,'' all but ignore our race-based differences. Indeed, ``MiB'' has only one, throwaway gag line, ad-libbed by Smith himself, that acknowledges the actor's color.

``Nothing to Lose,'' on the other hand, repeatedly addresses such topics as class distinction and discriminatory hiring practices; Lawrence's unemployed electronics genius only turns to crime after being rejected for dozens of good jobs he's more than qualified for.

In ``Pulp Fiction,'' the John Travolta/Samuel L. Jackson hit-man combo peppered their speech with derogatory epithets, but it was all done in a bantering, pros-at-work spirit that indicated no animosity - at least of a color-based origin - existed between them. (Their victims, of course, experienced animosity of another kind.)

When Jackson teamed up with Bruce Willis a year later for ``Die Hard With a Vengeance,'' he played a much more politicized, resentful sort of guy, but that still didn't stop him from helping Willis again and again, starting with getting him out of a racially charged jam the white cop provoked.

Two sports scammers played by Woody Harrelson and Wesley Snipes joined entrepreneurial forces in ``White Men Can't Jump,'' the whole premise of which rested on Caucasians' presumably inferior basketball skills. In a later Snipes-Harrelson team-up, the action thriller ``Money Train,'' they took the partnership a step further and played adopted brothers.

These and such diverse films as ``Rising Sun,'' ``Amos & Andrew'' and ``Bulletproof'' have precedents that go back to the Richard Pryor-Gene Wilder '70s comedies ``Silver Streak'' and ``Stir Crazy,'' to Bill Cosby and Robert Culp's mid-'60s TV series ``I Spy'' and to such Rat Pack comedies as ``Ocean's Eleven'' and ``Salt and Pepper,'' in which Sammy Davis Jr. messed around with pals such as Frank Sinatra and Peter Lawford.

It was Eddie Murphy's first two films, however, that really defined the style of interracial buddy movies: ``48 HRS.'' with its macho, nothing-is-sacred attitude and ``Trading Places'' with its broad, winking approach to social comedy, pretty much set the guidelines in which the subsequent team-ups worked out their relationships.

Worked them out and found a range of individual qualities in the process. It's funny, but also quite encouraging, that a group of films that play off of basic story conventions and perceived racial distinctions can generate so many diverse viewpoints.

And still end up with everyone who's left breathing feeling better about each other.

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8 Photos

Photo: (1--Cover--Color) Martin Lawrence, left, and Tim Robbins in ``Nothing to Lose.''

(2) Hollywood's streak of interracial buddy movies continues with Tim Robbins, left, and Martin Lawrence in ``Nothing to Lose.''

(3) Richard Pryor and Gene Wilder in ``Silver Streak.''

(4) Dan Aykroyd and Eddie Murphy in ``Trading Places.''

(5) Eddie Murphy and Nick Nolte in ``48 HRS.''

(6) Danny Glover and Mel Gibson in ``Lethel Weapon 3.''

(7) Wesley Snipes and Sean Connery in ``Rising Sun.''

(8) Wesley Snipes and Woody Harrelson in ``White Men Can't Jump.''

(9) Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones in ``Men in Black.''