HAIL, CAESAR!: Not Top Tier Coen Brothers, But At Times It Comes Close

Opening today at both multiplexes and art houses (but mainly multiplexes):

HAIL, CAESAR! (Dirs. Joel & Ethan Coen, 2016)

“This motion picture contains no visual depiction of the godhead.” – End Credits Disclaimer

After the bleak, gray-toned terrain of their last few pictures, 2010’s TRUE GRIT and 2013’s INSIDE LLEWYN DAVIS, the Coen brothers mix it up with this colorful, star-studded satire of ‘50s Hollywood.

In his third film for the master filmmaking siblings, Josh Brolin heads the cast as Eddie Mannix, the head production chief for the fictional Capital Studios, who mainly works as a “fixer” (somebody who keeps actors’ scandals out of the press). We first meet Mannix in a confessional, where the man cries over the sin of sneaking cigarettes and lying to his wife (Alison Pill) about it.

From there, we learn about the troubled production of a big expensive Roman-Biblical epic (a film-within-the-film also titled “Hail, Caesar”), which stars Baird Whitlock, an idiot of a matinee idol played by another Coen bros. veteran, George Clooney. On the set, Clooney gets drugged by a couple of extras (Wayne Knight and Jeff Lewis), and gets taken to a Malibu beach mansion where he is held for ransom by an organization of communist screenwriters who call themselves “The Future.” That’s right, it’s another Coen brothers’ kidnap caper!

Intertwined are the tales of a few of Mannix’s other clients: Hobie Doyle (stand-out newcomer Alden Ehrenreich), a B-movie cowboy star actor who, while working on a western, is told that the studio wants to change his image, and DeeAnna Moran (Scarlett Johansson in her second Coen brothers film after THE MAN WHO WASN'T THERE), obviously modeled on MGM’s swimming superstar Esther Williams, whose pregnancy threatens to ruin another production (another film-within-the-film). Johansson, who speaks in a New Yawk accent that will be familiar to SNL fans, has a juicy albeit brief part, involving an even briefer Jonah Hill cameo.

Then there’s Tilda Swinton, also making her second appearance in the Coen canon, hamming it up in a dual role as Thora and Thessaly Thacker, twin sister gossip columnists who confront Mannix (separately, but one right after the other) for a scoop every time he leaves his office.

In a extremely well choreographed production number from yet another film-within-this-film, Coen brothers first-timer Channing Tatum steals the movie in a sailor suit in a helplessly homoerotic song and dance routine to a tune called “No Dames.” Tatum, and his fellow seamen, athletically tap dance up a storm around a saloon set on top of the bar, stools, and tables, while Tatum puts in some surprisingly smooth singing on top of it. It’s a smile-inducing highlight.

The more I think about it, the more I like HAIL, CAESAR! It’s not top tier Coen brothers, but at times it comes awfully close. Such times include an early scene in which Brolin’s Mannix assembles a group of religious leaders from different faiths to make sure that the “theological elements are up to snuff” in “Hail, Caesar!,” which humorously recalls the spirituality spoofing of A SERIOUS MAN.

The sitting room scenes involving “The Future,” with its wonderfully cast members including Max Baker, David Krumholtz, Patrick Fischler, Fisher Stevens, and Fred Melamed, who happened to be in A SERIOUS MAN, also share that period piece’s vibe, as well as more of a palpable sense of McCarthy-era paranoia than TRUMBO could muster.

Also up there, or at least one that I laughed out loud at, is a bit where Ralph Fiennes as a stuffy director (named Laurence Laurentz, because of course he is) of stuffy drawing room dramas is saddled with Ehrenreich’s Doyle and can’t get him to satisfactorily deliver one particular line (“Would that it were true” being the line that gets repeatedly massacred).

With its A-list ensemble running around in silly scenarios, I expected something more screwball, a lark a la BURN AFTER READING, but the lighter, restrained wackiness of HAIL, CAESAR masks layers of meaning underneath that I predict us critic folk will be trying to decipher for ages.

After saying that BURN was the last time he’d play an idiot for the Coens, I’m glad Clooney reconsidered and came back for what Joel Coen has jokingly referred to as “the fourth installment of the George Clooney numbskull trilogy.” 

But as apt as Clooney is as a movie star dolt, it’s Brolin’s show, and it’s his best work for the Coen brothers - his jaded stoicism is the film’s rock. The character is the only one in the film that’s directly based on a real person of the same name (the real Eddie Mannix was a studio fixer for MGM), and Brolin puts in a weighty performance that would’ve fit right into serious-minded movies set in the same era like L.A. CONFIDENTIAL.

It doesn’t all flow seamlessly – there’s some HUDSUCKER PROXY-ish clunkiness, and some bits that flatline - but the film achieves BARTON FINK-style brilliancy more than a few times (it’s no coincidence that Capital Pictures is the studio in both films).

It’s too early to see how HAIL, CAESAR! ranks among the rest of the Coen brothers’ filmography, but I can already say that its miles above their lesser efforts (THE LADYKILLERS and INTOLERABLE CRUELTY). 

The fun of its fake movie production numbers, its authentic Technicolor look (shot on film by longtime Coen brothers collaborator, cinematographer Roger Deakins), and, of course, its more than capable cast, make it a film that you don’t have to be a film buff to appreciate. But it sure does help.

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Two Epic Fantasy Fails: JUPITER ASCENDING & SEVENTH SON

This last week hasn’t been a good one for me in the big ass 3D CGI-ed fantasy film dept. I had the displeasure of donning the annoying plastic glasses for screenings of two duds: The Wachowskis’ newest sci-fi flick JUPITER ASCENDING, and Sergei Bodrov’s medieval adventure SEVENTH SON, both opening today at a multiplex near you.

Despite admiring the first MATRIX movie, and enjoying segments of CLOUD ATLAS (co-directed by Tom Tykwer), I can’t say I’m a big fan of The Wachowskis’ canon. Yet I appreciate that they do have a distinct, undeniable vision, and the fact that their latest isn’t based on a book, graphic novel, video game, or any pre-existing entity of any kind did appeal to me.

But the story, involving Mila Kunis as Jupiter, a lowly maid scrubbing toilets in Chicago who learns that she’s alien royalty, never came together amid its strained set-pieces and overly talky passages.

Channing Tatum, sporting pointy ears and eyeliner as he’s a “splice” of wolf and man, plays Kunis’ protector/love interest. Tatum, whose appearance reminds me of John Candy’s half man, half dog SPACEBALLS character, seems to not have completely shaken off his stoical Marc Shultz persona from FOXCATCHER, which leads to some charisma-less exchanges with Kunis.

Eddie Redmayne, Oscar nominee for his role as Stephen Hawking in THE THEORY OF EVERYTHING (itself nominated for Best Picture), plays the villain, Balem Abrasax, who wants to kill Kunis and harvest the earth – what else? The Wachowskis have surely taken a queue from STAR TREK in making their villain all Shakespearian, and Redmayne, whose every line of dialogue is either whispered or screamed, left no piece of scenery unchewed.

A centerpiece action sequence over the skyline of Chicago – Tatum has these anti-gravity boots you see – was one of the most cluttered and unexciting chases I’ve seen in a long time, and I’ve seen a lot of cluttered and unexciting chases in the last several years.

Sadly, The Wachowskis’ effort here recalls the worst of sci-fi fantasy in film; the intergalactic cities, landscapes, and costumes are nearly identical to the imagery and aesthetics of the lame ass STAR WARS prequels, and the cosmically convoluted scenarios are straight out of the notorious king of sci-fi flops, BATTLEFIELD EARTH.

JUPITER ASCENDING is a generic looking space opera that is without gusto or invested invention. Worse of all, Kunis looks really bored. That might be me just projecting, because I know I sure was.

Now quick, before it leaves my brain, let me see what I remember of Bodrov’s SEVENTH SON, which I just saw last night but is evaporating rapidly. Based on Joseph Delaney’s young adult novel “The Spook’s Apprentice” (I can see why they changed that), the film stars newcomer (well, new to me) Ben Barnes as the seventh son of a seventh son who joins the grizzled Master Gregory (Jeff Bridges in another very “undude” later day role) in hunting down a witch queen played by an energetic but not entirely convincing Julianne Moore. Here’s hoping this misappropriation of her talents doesn’t overshadow her vastly more essential, and Oscar nominated work in STILL ALICE (opening in my area on Feb. 13th).

Now I love Bridges, and seeing him reunited with his BIG LEBOWSKI co-star Moore did give me a little bit of a charge, but his character, a crochety blend of Gandalf and Rooster Cogburn, isn’t very imaginatively written or acted. The old coot even mumbles “fuckin’ witches” when exiting the room at one point. Maybe after winning the Oscar for TRUE GRIT, the guy decided he doesn't need to try anymore. Hence crap like R.I.P.D. and this.

Barnes, with his bedhead and spare stubble that makes him look like an indie rocker or a boyfriend on Girls, has little or zero presence. He blends into the background of battles with witches that turn into dragons, and is even upstaged by Bridges’ ogre servant (John DeSantis).

Awful special effects, the badness of which is enhanced by the fiercely unnecessary 3D conversion; atrocious dialogue, sloppily edited swordplay, and incompetent pacing make SEVENTH SON a dreadful, dreary slog. Even their attempts to scare with random monsters, dragons, ghosts, and even a bear screaming right in-your-face didn’t keep me from almost nodding off.

So, that’s two genre pictures that really didn’t gel for me, getting released in the cinematic off season of February. As that’s roughly four hours of bloated CGI-saturated fantasy blather that I’m so glad is over, here’s hoping neither will be successful enough to spawn a sequel.

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Blu Ray/DVD Review: THE BOOK OF LIFE

Releasing this week on Blu ray & DVD:

THE BOOK OF LIFE
(Dir. Jorge Gutierrez, 2014) *

This Mexico-set CG-animated musical comedy adventure is a vast improvement over the animation studio Reel FX’s first feature, last year’s FREE BIRDS.

While that unfunny fiasco was about time-traveling turkeys, THE BOOK OF LIFE, the directorial debut of long-time television animator Jorge Gutierrez, has a lot more ambition by way of a fantastical storyline that pays vividly colorful respect to Mexican folklore. That Guillermo del Toro (PAN’S LABYRINTH, PACIFIC RIM) is one of the film’s producers gives it a bit of cinematic gravitas as well.

Unfortunately, it’s often clunky and cluttered, with hard-to-care-about experiences and loads of jokes that were met by silence at the screening I attended – one packed with families with kids.

The characters are accurately described as wooden; through the framing device of a museum tour guide (voiced by Christina Applegate) telling the film’s tale to a group of snotty school children, the major players are represented by handcrafted wooden figures that come to life as marionettes without strings.

Via Applegate’s narration, we are taken to a Mexican landscape sometime in the unspecified past on the Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) holiday, and introduced to a love triangle in which two young suitors – the sensitive Manolo (Diego Luna) and the cocky warrior Joaquin (Channing Tatum, in his first animated feature) – compete for the hand of the beautiful, free-spirited Maria (Zoe Saldana).

Watching from above, the squabbling husband-and-wife deities, La Muerta (Kate del Castillo), ruler of the Land of the Remembered, and Xibalba (Ron Perlman), ruler of the Land of the Forgotten, make a high-stakes wager on which suitor will marry Maria.

Manolo’s father (Hector Elizondo) wants him to carry on the family’s bullfighting tradition, but Manolo wants to be a musician. This gives the film the peg for both its transparent “follow your dreams” moral and its musical numbers. Annoyingly interjected into the action is a bunch of Latin-tinged American pop songs, including Rod Stewart’s “If You Think I’m Sexy,” Biz Markie’s “Just a Friend” and even Radiohead’s “Creep.”

There are some decent original songs written by Oscar-winning composers Paul Williams and Gustavo Santaolalla and performed by Luna and Saldana. One entitled “I Love You Too Much” is catchy enough to be a hit. (It’s also a plus that they don’t make Tatum sing.)

Of course, every animated movie aimed at kids has to be in 3-D these days, and this one has more elements that can be enhanced by the format than most – like a sequence involving Manolo running through a mega maze before speeding boulders crash down the corridors and crush him. But it made very little difference otherwise.

The presence of Ice Cube as a cuddly, goofy ancient god called “The Candlemaker” is irksome. The rapper/actor’s performance is “on,” but it seems a cynical piece of casting designed to up the hipness factor. Still, he drew some genuine laughs.

Despite the fact that a character dies, parents won’t have to worry about the film being dark or disturbing enough to give children nightmares. But on the flip side, THE BOOK OF LIFE isn’t magical or memorable enough to really resonate later, either.

* This review originally appeared in the October 16th, 2014 edition of the Raleigh News & Observer.

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Read more here: http://www.newsobserver.com/2014/10/16/4235680_review-book-of-life-fantastical.html?rh=1#storylink=cpy

FOXCATCHER: Effectively Moody But Unengaging

FOXCATCHER (Dir. Bennett Miller, 2014)

Channing Tatum’s performance as real life wrestler Mark Schultz in FOXCATCHER, opening today at an indie art theater near me, is so stoical and withdrawn that it made me forget how funny he was in the 21 JUMP STREET movies or how charming he was in MAGIC MIKE. It’s that intense.

So is the film, based on the events leading up to the murder of Mark’s older brother the gold medal winning Olympic wrestler Dave Schultz by the very eccentric, or just plain odd, multimillionaire John du Pont, roles respectively portrayed by Mark Ruffalo and Steve Carell.

Ruffalo, with his close-cropped beard and receding hairline, and Carell, sporting gray hair (also receding) and a large beak-like nose prosthetic are both almost unrecognizable, and their mannerisms sure won’t be familiar to Marvel or Michael Scott fans either.

But it’s Tatum who carries the film, as he walks us through the motions of a wrestler, who despite having won a gold medal himself, is wrestling (sorry) with the inner torment of being in his brother’s shadow and not knowing what his next move should be.

Out of the blue, Tatum’s Mark gets a call from an assistant (Anthony Michael Hall, who I also didn’t recognize at first) to John du Pont, inviting him to Foxcatcher Farm, the du Pont estate in Pennsylvania.

At a beyond creepy first meeting, du Pont invites Mark to live and train for the World Championships and 1988 Olympics at a facility he's built on his family’s estate and Mark accepts. Du Pont also wants his brother to join them, but Dave declines the offer as he doesn’t want to uproot his family.

With his snobby, disapproving mother (Vanessa Redgrave), and obsessions with birds and Civil War guns, we get a sense of how du Pont’s isolated strangeness came to be, but there’s little depth in the drawn-out scenes illustrating the strained relationship between he and Mark.

When Dave finally relents – presumably because du Pont makes him an offer he can’t refuse – and moves his family to Foxcatcher, he becomes reasonably concerned about the sway the wealthy sponsor has over his brother.

The film is impeccably made and effectively moody with compellingly edited wrestling scenes, Grieg Fraser’s moody cinematography, and production designer Jess Gonchor and set designer Kathy Lucas’ impressive recreation of the Foxcatcher estate, yet I could never fully engage with the material.

The viewpoints of each character can be summed up in their spare lines such as when Redgrave as du Pont’s mother says that wrestling is a “low sport,” and du Pont later says of her show ponies: “horses are stupid.” There’s really not much insight beyond that.

Tatum does an admirable job inhabiting the skin of a real person who appears to never stop beating himself up inside, and Carell's work here is certainly on another level than his customary turns in broad comedies, but I doubt they'll really connect with audiences - i.e. I'm not seeing a lot award season action in their future, especially with this year's competition.

Miller’s previous work, from the feisty 1998 documentary THE CRUISE through his justly acclaimed dramas CAPOTE and MONEYBALL, have successfully told layered true stories, and on the surface FOXCATCHER joins them as a handsome prestige picture with strong performances, but I really was hoping for more of a storytelling oomph. 

There’s an icy distance to this depiction, which was scripted by Dan Futterman (CAPOTE) and E. Max Frye, that made me feel like I was watching these people through a window; I never felt like I was in the room or in the moment with them.

Not that I’d really want to be in the room with either of these versions of Carell or Tatum, and even Ruffalo doesn’t seem here like much of a fun guy, but there’s a spark needed to ignite this sad story into something vital and necessary. As it stands, I’m really not sure why Miller thought this was a tale that cinematically had to be told.

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22 JUMP STREET: A Funny As F*** Follow-up That Makes Fun Of Itself

Now playing at a multiplex near us all:

22 JUMP STREET 
(Phil Lord & Christopher Miller, 2014)

The first movie looked like it was going to be crappy, but actually turned out to be fairly funny in its riffing on being a big screen version of a ‘80s undercover cop show.

The sequel amps it up by riffing on being a sequel to the surprise hit big screen version of a ‘80s undercover cop show.

And I laughed a lot more this time. A lot more.

Jonah Hill and Channing Tatum return as officers Schmidt and Jenko, the partying, gun-toting duo who engage in their own particular brand of bromantic banter. This time, much of their banter revolves around being on an investigation that's just like the last one, except now it's college, not high school, and they have a much bigger budget.

To amusingly justify the movie's title, the police team’s headquarters has been moved across the street into a bigger church with vastly upgraded facilities resulting in many comments about how needlessly expensive everything looks. 

Ice Cube, reprising his hilariously drawn role as Captain Dickson, even remarks that the place looks like it's out of IRON MAN.

Posing as college students at the fictional MC State (short for Metropolitan City State), Hill and Tatum's assignment involves finding who's been dealing the dangerous drug “WhyPhy” (WiFi).

In the process, Tatum falls in with some air-headed football players (Wyatt Russell and Jimmy Tatro), while Hill, in the guise of a slam poet, falls for an art student (Amber Stevens). The film here toys with rom com conventions, but funnily enough more with Tatum connecting with Russell (Kurt's son btw) than Hill's courtship of Stevens; they even make a meta joke about them having a meet-cute via the merging of a meat sandwich and a Q-Tip.

Popping up throughout the guys' campus shenanigans, are cameos by Patton Oswalt as a psychology professor, standup partners/identical twins the Lucas Brothers as drugged-up dorm neighbors, Peter Stormare as an international criminal only known as “Ghost,” along with, from the first film, Dave Franco, and Rob Riggle, now prison inmate lovers (Franco, not by choice).

Riggle was the previous films' secret bad guy, and there's one in this one too, but don't worry I won't spoil that tasty twist.

Gags about sequel tropes are joined by gags about how old the leads look to be college students (“I got 99 problems but being young ain't one,” Jillian Bell as Stevens' acerbic roommate quips), gags about how close to gay these guys get in their bro-bonding, gags about college sex (the “walk of shame” bits are dead on), just gags about everything along these lines that they could stuff into the 112 minute running time.

Directors Phil Lord and Christopher, the dudes behind the also ultra meta, and equally hilarious THE LEGO MOVIE, working from a screenplay by Michael Bacall (writer of the first one), Oren Uziel, and Rodney Rothman, never let up on the film's sense of fun right through to end where they go from making fun of sequels to taking on entire franchises.

Hill and Tatum are very funny here, they play off each other brilliantly and again prove that their pairing is no fluke, but Ice Cube, in his expanded role, is an angry comedy machine! In a restaurant-set scene in which he finds out that his daughter is dating Hill, Cube's performance is a tour de force of comic acting.

22 JUMP STREET is a funny as fuck follow-up that makes fun of itself for its simple cynical existence as a sequel, but it never makes fun of us for watching it. It wants us to be as in on the joke as they are, and have us all laugh together. With this many surefire laughs, and well tapped talent on display, I even felt a bit laughed out afterwards. Still, make sure you stay through the end credits for the final stinger.

Oddly, one of the only joke misfires was a reference to the comedy stylings of Tracy Morgan *. This was, of course, filmed last year, and it's so not a diss, but it got a bit of a gasp from the audience at the screening I attended. However, that bit of bad timing didn't throw off the crowd for long; they were rolling as soon as the next joke came around, which was less than 10 seconds later.

* If you haven't heard, Tracy Morgan is currently in critical but stable condition after his car crash last weekend. Film Babble Blog sends its best wishes for Morgan, the other victims of the accident, and their families.

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WHITE HOUSE DOWN: More Fun Than It Has A Right To Be

 Opening today at a multiplex near you:

WHITE HOUSE DOWN (Dir. Roland Emmerich, 2013)

So, yeah, it shares the same premise, and pretty much the same title as OLYMPUS HAS FALLEN from earlier this year (Olympus being the fictional code name for the White House in that movie), but Roland Emmerich’s WHITE HOUSE DOWN is bigger, dumber, and a lot more fun than that like-minded Gerald Butler action vehicle. 

They’re both stupid, but if watching OLYMPUS HAS FALLEN makes you shake your head, watching WHITE HOUSE DOWN makes you laugh out loud while you're shaking your head.

In Emmerich’s much more preferable take on the DIE HARD meets AIR FORCE ONE formula, Jamie Foxx is the President, Channing Tatum his Secret Service savior against an attack on the White House by a domestic paramilitary group. Actually, Tatum isn’t in the Secret Service; he just happens to be there applying for the job shortly before the hostile takeover occurs. 

Tatum gets turned down for the position by Maggie Gyllenhaal, as the chief Secret Service supervisor or something, so he takes his daughter (12-year old Joey King, who looks kinda like a tiny Sandra Bernhard) on a tour of the famous Pennsylvania Avenue residence.

Foxx (going from freed slave in DJANGO UNCHAINED to the Commander in Chief in six months - now there's an American success story!) is established right up front as a noble, dignified peace-seeking President of the people. 

Of course, one can’t help but think of Obama, especially when Foxx chews nicotine gum and mimics a few familiar mannerisms, but there’s no real statement being made here about our current administration, it’s just all in good fun.

Of course there’s corruption among all the President’s men with James Woods, seemingly reprising his role as H.R. Haldeman from Oliver Stone's NIXON, being the first baddie we can identify as a retiring Head of Presidential Detail who orchestrates the evil plan because he blames Foxx for the death of his son in the Middle East.

So Tatum’s tour group is taken hostage, and you know the DIE HARD drill - most of the action has Tatum, who strips down to the Bruce Willis-style wife beater tank top, and Foxx running around dodging machine gun bullets, getting into brutal fist fights, talking on walkie talkies, and making heroic wise-cracks all over the rooms, and hallways of the historical house.

There’s even a hilarious SUV chase all over the White House lawn to break up all the inside scenes. The leader of the thugs they fight, ZERO DARK THIRTY’s Jason Clarke is a particularly good bad guy, who gets angrier as the body count of baddies rises – these guys are usually related to each other or real close so there’s that revenge incentive growing.

Everybody appears to know how silly this all is, but they play every action movie cliché with a straight face, and that results in many genuine laughs, even if at times you can’t tell if something is intentionally funny or unintentionally funny. This move gleefully doesn’t care about the difference.

An incidental character, a know-it-all White House tour guide played by Nicholas Wright is responsible for some amusing moments as he’s personally offended by the thugs’ destruction of the house’s priceless artifacts. Michael Murphy has a thankless nothing role as the Vice President, who spends the movie aboard Air Force One, but Richard Jenkins has a better part as the Speaker of the House, but it’s a pretty transparent role too.

No matter, they’re just well-oiled parts of this machine of a movie that I bet movie-goers will enjoy than most of the other big ass offerings out there (WORLD WAR Z, MAN OF STEEL, and STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS, I’m looking in your direction). Emmerich has made big dumb disaster flicks before (INDEPENDENCE DAY, THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW, 2012), but this one has more appeal due to it tongue in cheek tone, and its confidently corny approach.

I’m tempted to call WHITE HOUSE DOWN the summer’s best brainless blockbuster wannabe, but then I haven’t seen FAST & FURIOUS 6 yet. So I’ll just say that it’s a gloriously stupid good time at the movies this summer (just in time for 4th of July celebrating), and a better DIE HARD movie than the last actual DIE HARD movie.

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Mostly funny 21 JUMP STREET riffs on cop movie conventions

21 JUMP STREET (Dirs. Phil Lord & Chris Miller, 2012)

 

At one point in this reboot/re-imagining/re-whatever of the ‘80s show 21 Jump Street (the Fox TV show that made Johnny Depp a household name), undercover cop heroes (Jonah Hill and Channing Tatum) are in the middle of a high speed ‘don’t let the bad guy get away!’ chase, and they commandeer a Student Driver car from their high school parking lot.

A driving instructor tries to stop them from taking the vehicle, but instead of running after them yelling expletives, and/or shaking his fist at them like in so many other movies, the hapless guy just shrugs and says “Aw, who cares?” then walks out of the shot.

In that, and many other amusing moments, 21 JUMP STREET shows its hand - it’s not here to viciously satirize cop movie conventions, it just wants to riff on them playfully.

Take the chase that follows - in all chaos of gas truck collisions they side-swipe, Hill and Tatum keep expecting huge explosions, because, you know, there are always explosions in these sequences – but the film toys with that scenario with a ‘wait for it’ type teasing.

As a couple of young immature policemen named Schmidt and Jenko who think they can party while fighting crime, Hill and Tatum are assigned to Jump Street under the lead of Captain Dickson (a hilariously harsh Ice Cube perfectly parodying the clichéd angry black police chief role) who complains of the program: “All they can do is recycle old ideas from the ‘80s” Get it?

So the doofus duo gets a do over of their unhappy high school years while trying to take down a synthetic drug ring and proving themselves as law enforcers, but nobody is going to see this for its plot – it’s all about the silly scatalogical shenanigans these guys get into. However, Hill and Tatum get more laughs from their frantic one-liner exchanges than the gross-out stuff.

The supporting cast doesn’t really stand out around their schtick – Brie Larson as Hill’s unlikely love interest is just a popular yet insecure high school blonde archetype, James Franco’s younger brother Dave doesn’t register either – only Rob Riggle, who seems to be having a lot of fun with his beefy high school coach character, makes an impression.

Directed by Phil Lord and Chris Miller (the guys who made CLOUDY WITH A CHANCE OF MEATBALLS), and written by Hill and Michael Bacall (co-writer of SCOTT PILGRIM VS. THE WORLD) 21 JUMP STREET falls into the tradition of making a movie out of a beloved TV show (See: Dragnet, The Brady Bunch, Starsky and Hutch, etc.) that’s as much a satire of its subject series as it is an self-consciously hip update.

It also falls into the category of movies that are just funny enough to get by (See: PAUL, HOT TUB TIME MACHINE, HORRIBLE BOSSES).

Obviously, It’s not shooting to be a comedy classic (or even an action comedy classic), it seems alright with being a lowbrow lark for teenagers or for folks that want to recall their teenage memories of old campy TV shows, in a comical light.

I want to say I wish it were just a tad funnier and a little less in-jokey, but…aw, who cares?

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