Neither the “Buddy Cop” nor “Buddy Cop Parody” movies are a new genre, but I, for one, never get tired of watching them. “The Other Guys” takes this style of movie and adds to it the most evil villain of our times, a corrupt financial advisor.
Will Ferrell and Mark Wahlberg play as detectives Allen Gamble and Terry Hoitz, a comically mismatched team of one “by the book” police accountant and a “loose cannon” who is set off by the orderly personality of his partner. Hoitz is sentenced to desk duty across from Gamble after accidentally shooting a beloved New York icon. Ferrell and Wahlberg do a good job of immersing themselves in these characters to make this movie feel like “Lethal Weapon” meets “The Odd Couple.”
Gamble and Hoitz set out to take the place of the movie’s opening pair of jerky super cops, played by Dwayne Johnson and Samuel L. Jackson, who die in a comically tragic accident by their own hands.
Throughout the film, most of the laughs come at the expense of Gamble’s cluelessness. The best example is when he performs his first “desk pop” at the request of two rival cops, played by Rob Riggle and Damon Wayans Jr., and has his firearm replaced with a wooden replica. Gamble’s Prius, love of the “Little River Band” and shady past add to the laughs.
The movie also features Michael Keaton as the hard-nosed Captain Mauch, who inadvertently keeps quoting “TLC” songs.
Fans of the “Buddy Cop” genre, satire or any Will Ferrell movies will be sure to find humor in this film, although at times it does seem to be reaching for laughs.
One of the most interesting aspects about the movie is during the closing credits; a diagram of how a Ponzi scheme works is shown on screen. After that, a comparison of past and present financial statistics that are sickening, at best, fill the screen. Leave it to a wacky movie that we only expect to get cheap laughs from to try to inspire us to take a closer look at the financial crisis facing the country.
To put it in the simplest terms, this is a humorous movie about two underdogs taking a shot to redeem themselves, and the mischief that happens along the way.
If you are looking to have a good time at the movies, “The Other Guys” are the right guys for the case.
