If you haven't seen the previous Beverly Hills Cop movies in a long time, like me, I would highly recommend you at least watch the first two before going into Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F (2024).
I remember enjoying all the previous movies but I've only seen each one maybe once or twice, around the time each was released - which is quite some time ago. I didn't re-watch any of them, assuming I'd just like this new film, and as a result I don't think I enjoyed it anywhere near as much as I might have.
Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F sees Detroit cop Axel Foley (Eddie Murphy) returning to Beverly Hills to help his now fully grown, lawyer, daughter, Jane (Taylour Paige) with a case that has endangered her life.
Naturally we see the return of several familiar faces as the story unfolds.
Other than watching the trailer I didn't really know a lot about the film going in, so I surprised to see Joseph Gordon-Levitt in the movie, underused as Detective Bobby Abbott.
He's supposed to fill the role Billy (Judge Reinhold) used to play in the earlier films as a cop who's yet to experience the freedom of not doing everything by the book. However he's not nearly as naïve as Billy was back in the day, and it really seems like he would've gone that route anyway.
The movie doesn't break any new ground for the series. It's pretty standard Axel Foley causing mayhem in Beverly Hills, while getting whoever he works alongside in trouble in the process.
There could've been a lot more opportunity to riff on modern policing methods compared to 20-30 years ago but it never really goes there.
Returning characters don't really get a lot of development in terms of what they've been up to. Seems like everyone has been doing what they've been doing, just a little higher up the command chain perhaps.
The action sequences are straight out of eighties and nineties action movies, with so much destruction, everyone involved would immediately be suspended, and probably hounded by news and social media in the modern context.
That aside, it's really just escapist entertainment, with a mix of comedy and action, like all the previous films. That's why I think you should re-watch them if you haven't seen them in a while.
Axel F is very much a nostalgia play. While I caught the returning characters I feel I missed so much that would've meant something if I remembered more from the previous films.
While there were definitely good scenes, overall the film started to drag for me. Which I don't remember any of the previous films doing? I really would've like to have seen it at least have a more engaging detective story, that didn't look like every other film in the series.
All in all, Axel F is really just one last hurrah for the fans who wanted to see Eddie play this character one last time. I'd be surprised (but pleased) if they tried this again. It's fun but nothing new.
Comments
Post a Comment
Comments are moderated by an actual human (me, TET) and may not publish right away. I do read all comments and only reject those not directly related to the post or are spam/scams (I'm looking at you Illuminati recruiters... I mean scammers. Stop commenting on my Illuminati post!).