Sunday, June 22, 2014

22 Jump Street Review

22 Jump Street

Director: Phil Lord and Christopher Miller
Cast Headliners:  Channing Tatium, Jonah Hill, Ice Cube
Original Release Date: June 13, 2014

At some point 21 Jump Street was a serious police drama from the 1980’s starring Johnny Depp.   Then at a later point in 2012 it was rebooted with a film that had a approached which can simply be described as “radically different.”  The series has now become a comedy, and the premise of “cops going undercover in schools” totally worked when it came to humor.  Where before in all incarnations of the franchise the setting had been in high schools, now it has transitioned to taking place in a college.
Schmidt (Jonah Hill) and Greg(Channing Tatum) go on their mission to college sent by Cpt.Jackson (Ice Cube) of the now-22 Jump Street department. A lot of the jokes in this film happen on many levels; in this case the movie’s a sequel and they had to move down the street.  This is a trademark of directors  Phil Lord and Chris Miller, who have another good movie in 2014 after the brilliant Lego Movie in February.  Many times the movie references the fact that’s it’s a sequel and so on, which is good the first few time and less so after.
            One of the things 22 Jump Street mocks about itself is the fact that it’s so similar to the first film. And yes, there are a lot of parallels.  A fresh perspective comes from the fact that they are in college. So there’s the tropes of frats, and professors, and all the various mischief college brings.  The best laughs comes from Greg joining a fraternity and finding a new best friend in Zook(great up-and-comer Wyatt Russel) much to Schmidt’s agitation.   There’s not much that hasn’t really not been seen in a college movie before however.
            There’s some ok action sidelined to the laughs.  The situations are so extreme, the laughs very constant.  It’s a silly movie that will deliver to its target audience.  It’s more of the same and that’s not a bad thing for this very, very silly comedy. 8 out of 10

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