When it comes to first impressions how, you are dressed can say a lot about you. In the film “Catch Me If You Can” Christopher Walken’s character tells his son the reason the Yankees always win, is because the other teams too busy staring at the pin stripes. There was a time when some professions just made you respect that person more. Professions like a pilot, an astronaut, or a doctor (well, some doctors), all that has changed today. Today it is all about being a movie star or the next big pop star, but there are still jobs that when you put on that uniform people look and treat you differently.
One of those real jobs that carry a certain amount of respect and or fear of course is a cop, a job that can be life threating. What would happen if two guys who got no resect were to put on the uniform, would everything change? That is the premise for the new film “Let’s Be Cops” Ryan (Jake Johnson) and Justin (Damon Wayans Jr.) are two thirty year old nobody’s. Ryan used to be a star quarterback in college while Justin wants to be video game designer. Life has not gone the way they planned, and both are about to give up on their Los Angeles dreams until, they put on a police uniform, and right away notice that everyone looks at them in a whole new way. Ryan is all in, as the respect he gets takes him back to a time when his life didn’t suck, but Justin reacts to it like he does most things in his life, with fear. Ryan and Justin start to solve a real case involving a gangster named Mossi (James D’ Arcy) and the activities he is involved in. After discovering what all Mossi is into, it is up to two fake cops to become two heroes before it is to late.
Having two guys dress as cops, could bring quite a bit of laughs, and from the trailer for this film, there seemed be many. The problem is, like the two guys pretending to be cops, this film pretends to be a comedy, only to try too hard at being an action movie. It could not catch the magic that “21 Jump St.” had, even with an interesting premise. Writers Luke Greefield and Nicholas Thomas missed a golden opportunity to make something truly funny, only to differ to making a movie that we have seen a thousand times before. It is hard to go into a comedy and not laugh, and this movie achieves that partially, but it’s almost like it was planed to look funny just to lure you in. Director Luke Greenfield (The Animal) puts out a cookie cutter film that had a desire to be something fresh and funny. With so many un-original ideas out there lately, to take a good one and turn it to just another one of “those” movies, is kind of sad. When it comes to being able to re-watch a movie, a great comedy can almost always hit the spot. “Let’s Be Cops” had the chance to be that movie, but they took the road most traveled, and we are left wondering what could have been.
Brian Taylor
