COP OUT, THE LATEST FROM director Kevin Smith, is a far cry from Dogma, or even Zack and Miri make a Porno. The movie isn’t bad, just exceedingly average. It is funny at certain points, but it isn’t the writing or the directing that pull off the humor so much as the actors slipping into fallback material as a seeming last ditch attempt to save the project. a tribute to 80s action flicks, Cop Out is a would-be classic tale of two cop buddies who behave like 9-year-olds trapped in the bodies of two middle-aged men.
Jimmy Monroe (Bruce Willis) and Paul Hodges (Tracy Morgan) are the kind of cops who interrogate suspects using lines from action movies. in an undercover mission dressed as a cell phone, Paul manages to out an ongoing organized crime investigation, which results in a 30-day suspension for him and Jimmy. Meanwhile, Jimmy discovers that he’s competing with his wife’s new husband (Jason Lee) to pay for his daughter’s (Michelle Trachtenberg) wedding, and decides to sell a valuable baseball card to pay for it. The card is stolen by a parkouring thief (Seann William Scott), and Paul and Jimmy are thrown into the center of a drug battle against the lethal Poh Boy (Guillermo Diaz). The subsequent sequence of stakeouts, car chases, and scenes of Paul calling his wife Debbie (Rashida Jones)–who he believes to be cheating–does result in laughs, though many of them are not exactly earned.
Cop Out is essentially a movie featuring two actors who can only play themselves uniting to fight crime. Morgan’s humor only really works when he’s allowed to live in a parallel universe while everyone around him pretends not to notice. Willis, on the other hand, depends on a certain level of intensity from his fellow actors to make him look like an average Joe in comparison. The chemistry between them just misses, and Willis often looks like he’s in pain, as though someone forced him to be in this movie.
Cop Out also takes profanity and body humor to new extremes, with monologues discussing the advantages of holding in a dump, the physicality of that dump, where it should be taken, and when. And the surrounding characters are just as ludicrous. Adam Brody and Kevin Pollak appear as the super white, super nerdy, super clueless rival duo. Brody makes Pollak look like he has a mild social disorder, and their shtick drags painfully. Similarly, Poh Boy’s attempts to be a funny with his baseball obsession fall flat next to his violent streak, which is too cruel to be funny. worst was watching Seann William Scott’s character interact with Morgan’s Paul; it was like watching toddlers on meth fight over a Tonka truck, all reflected in the pained bemusement Willis couldn’t quite wipe from his face. in addition, the part of Jason Lee’s Roy–Jimmy’s ex’s smarmy second husband–is over the top and, frankly, disgusting. It’s hard to believe that anyone would say the things he says.
You can’t help but laugh at the movie’s absurdity and, yes, some of the one-liners. Still, Cop Out is smug, as though the characters are certain what they’re doing will make you laugh, which in turn detracts from the overall humor. While it’s not a movie to rush out and see, if you’re at the theater wondering which tickets to buy, this would suffice for an enjoyable evening, though not a particularly memorable one.
Recent Comments