Cop Out (2010)
Directed by Kevin Smith
Detectives Jimmy and Paul, despite nine years as partners, can still sometimes seem like polar opposites—especially when Paul's unpredictable antics get them suspended without pay. Already strapped for cash and trying to pay for his daughter's wedding, Jimmy decides to sell a rare baseball card that's worth tens of thousands. Unfortunately, when the collector's shop is robbed and the card vanishes with the crook, Paul and Jimmy end up going rogue, tracking down the card and the drug ring behind its theft, all on their own time and without any backup—except for each other.
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A discussion at the open about the meaning of the word "homage"with Paul mispronouncing it, har-harleads into a disastrous scene where Paul interrogates a suspect by acting out lines of dialogue from movies ranging from "Heat" and " Training Day " to "The Color Purple" and "Schindler's List."
Paul walks in with a gun, all crazy-eyed, throwing about lines from things ranging from Training Day and Heat to Schindler's List and The Color Purple with some Star Wars tossed in for good measure.
Lobbying for the part of “bad cop,” Paul insists that his years of watching cop movies have prepared him for this moment, and launches a performative assault on the detainee that begins with bits from Heat and Training Day, but quickly devolves into a channeling of Harpo from The Color Purple.
Jim watches from behind the one-way mirror as Paul interrogates by running through dozens of quotes from other movies: " Training Day ," " Heat ," " Schindler's List " and even " Dirty Dancing ."
Then, not content, the overly ambitious Smith took it a step further, and we get allusions to "Heat," Training Day," "Scarface," "Star Wars," "Schindler's List," "The Color Purple," "Cool Hand Luke," "They Call Me Mr. Tibbs," even "Jaws."
"Cop Out" is a buddy cop film in which one of the cops continually quotes dialogue espoused by fictional cops, in everything from "Heat" to "RoboCop," and not once is it funny.
That's also true of a subplot that has Jimmy chafing at his ex-wife's smug second husband (Jason Lee), and it goes double for all material related to Jimmy's pursuit of a valuable baseball card, which ends up in the hands of a Mexican drug lord (Guillermo Diaz, trying to make Al Pacino in "Scarface" look subtle).
That turns out to be the gift that keeps on giving as Morgan lifts line after line from all his favorite movies; "Scarface," he mouths to the two-way window at one point, where a crowd of cops has gathered to keep score.
Morgan wins out and proceeds on an “homage”-based line of questioning that has him riffing wildly on characters from movies, from Al Pacino in Scarface to Oprah Winfrey in The Color Purple.
It's not as great as Edgar Wright's "Hot Fuzz" or David Gordon Green's "Pineapple Express" but, in a way, that's a good thing.
Smith’s apparent contribution to the material (written by Robb and Mark Cullen) is haphazardly using a synth score, songs by the Beastie Boys and Poison, and random slow-mo shots to cast his slapdash lark as an homage to ‘80s buddy cop actioners, an objective—already tired, in light of Hot Fuzz and Pineapple Express —further hammered home by faux-Axel Foley Themes and Tracy Morgan opening the proceedings by over-pronouncing the “h” in “homage.”
Cop Out could have been an American equivalent of Hot Fuzz but it instead feels like an anachronistic forgotten film that you once owned on VHS.
Obviously, “Cop Out” is inspired by any number of violent action movies made over the years in which bullets and banter are doled out in equal numbers, including such classics of the form as “Freebie and the Bean” and “Lethal Weapon” and there are essentially two ways to approach such material--either give it an ironic or satiric twist as was done with the brilliant “Hot Fuzz” or play it in a more straightforward manner along the lines of the equally inspired “Pineapple Express.”
Lacking the genre-thumping deftness of a film like Hot Fuzz or the appealing kitsch of Dragnet, Cop Out turns its lonely eyes to its two lead performers.
Except as a cute little nod to the cliches of the genre - something better films like Hot Fuzz would have been able to actually work into the story.
Paul walks in with a gun, all crazy-eyed, throwing about lines from things ranging from Training Day and Heat to Schindler's List and The Color Purple with some Star Wars tossed in for good measure.
Lobbying for the part of “bad cop,” Paul insists that his years of watching cop movies have prepared him for this moment, and launches a performative assault on the detainee that begins with bits from Heat and Training Day, but quickly devolves into a channeling of Harpo from The Color Purple.
Jim watches from behind the one-way mirror as Paul interrogates by running through dozens of quotes from other movies: " Training Day ," " Heat ," " Schindler's List " and even " Dirty Dancing ."
A discussion at the open about the meaning of the word "homage"with Paul mispronouncing it, har-harleads into a disastrous scene where Paul interrogates a suspect by acting out lines of dialogue from movies ranging from "Heat" and " Training Day " to "The Color Purple" and "Schindler's List."
These are the comic book versions of cops, which is fine since Cop Out isn't trying to be Training Day.
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It's not as great as Edgar Wright's "Hot Fuzz" or David Gordon Green's "Pineapple Express" but, in a way, that's a good thing.
Smith’s apparent contribution to the material (written by Robb and Mark Cullen) is haphazardly using a synth score, songs by the Beastie Boys and Poison, and random slow-mo shots to cast his slapdash lark as an homage to ‘80s buddy cop actioners, an objective—already tired, in light of Hot Fuzz and Pineapple Express —further hammered home by faux-Axel Foley Themes and Tracy Morgan opening the proceedings by over-pronouncing the “h” in “homage.”
Obviously, “Cop Out” is inspired by any number of violent action movies made over the years in which bullets and banter are doled out in equal numbers, including such classics of the form as “Freebie and the Bean” and “Lethal Weapon” and there are essentially two ways to approach such material--either give it an ironic or satiric twist as was done with the brilliant “Hot Fuzz” or play it in a more straightforward manner along the lines of the equally inspired “Pineapple Express.”
His technical skills have improved over the years — there were a few sequences in his last film, “Zack and Miri Make a Porno,” that were nicely shot and put together.
At its best, it’s a delightfully silly, carefree bit of profane nonsense, effectively scraping away the stale taste left behind by Smith’s lifeless 2008 feature, “Zack and Miri Make a Porno.”
When the muse visits him, Smith gets inspired and makes fun movies like " Zack and Miri Make a Porno ."
Since director Kevin Smith (2008's " Zack and Miri Make a Porno ") has claimed via Twitter that he took an eighty percent pay cut on this, his first major studio release that he didn't write the screenplay for, one cannot rightfully say that he has sold his soul.
It’s not like Smith can’t be crude: his last movie was called Zack and Miri Make a Porno , for Christ’s sake.
The director has a distinctive way with satire, keeping the cuts below the belt and always sharp whether directed at religion ('99's "Dogma") or porn (2008's better-than-its-box-office "Zack and Miri Make a Porno").