Cop Out (2010)

When I heard that Kevin Smith was making a movie that was not written by him, I thought it was nice change of pace for him to expand his horizons. Cop Out was the finished product of the spec script A Couple of Dicks written by the Cullen Brothers that was listed on the 2008 Black List of the best unproduced screenplays. Given that, this movie was like a fish flapping around the floor.

Bruce Willis and Tracy Morgan play the most the unlikely NYC cop partners for nine years, Jimmy Monroe and Paul Hodges. They have a suspect in the interrogation room, Raul (Juan Carlos Hernández) who they want to wrestle some info about a major drug exchange happening. Hodges wants to take over the duties, but Monroe is the more serious of the duo. When Hodges bursts into the room, he unleashes a cavalcade of cheesy one-liners from literally every movie in existence.

Worn down from the assault on his eardrums, Juan gives up the deets for the drop later that afternoon with a local gang member, Juan Diaz (Cory Fernandez) at his cell phone store. The partners go undercover with Hodges dressed as giant cell phone and Monroe being the lookout.

The deal goes bad when the informant tips Juan that he was a snitch. Juan is killed. They try to capture Juan, but he gets away. Their boss, Captain Romans (Sean Cullen) suspends them for thirty days without for botching the job and not informing the local gang task force who consisted of Hunsaker (Kevin Pollack) and Barry Mangold (Adam Brody). Jimmy doesn’t want that because his daughter, Ava (Michelle Trachtenberg) is getting married in six weeks. He needs at least $50,000 to pay for her dream wedding.

Not having a job, Monroe thinks of selling his most prized possession; a 1952 Eddie Palko baseball card. When Jimmy tries to his card to a collector, Big Al (Keith Joe Dick) the place is robbed by Dave (Seann William Scott) and his friend (Ernest O’Donnell). They tase Jimmy, steal his card and the gun that came from Paul glove compartment with his spars badges.

Jimmy noticed a distinctive tattoo on Dave’s forearm. They track him down to a beach house breaking into it “Crouching Tiger” style. With Dave in custody, he tries to distract with repeating Paul ala Michael Scott when he’s upset and telling knock-knock jokes. They handcuff Dave to the back of their car. Dave calls their bluff. He is dragged behind. Dave tells them that he has sold Jimmy’s card and Paul’s gun to a local gang leader, Poh Boy (Guillermo Díaz) so he could get high.

In a meeting with him, Poh Boy being an avid baseball collector wants Monroe and Hodges to trade. If they could bring back Poh Boy’s black Mercedes with precious cargo inside, then he could give Monroe his baseball card back.

I saw that the movie was getting some mostly negative reviews. I wanted to see how bad the movie is. It’s not bad. It feels uninspired. It’s like Kevin Smith didn’t care about the material, even though the material is laughably bad with the subplots about Hodge’s wife, Debbie (Rashida Jones) maybe cheating on him, the fascination of Mangold with a pair of cowboy boots, and countless other. I did not believe Tracy Morgan’s character in this movie. I did not believe that the bumbling idiots would be a cop for more than ten minutes, let alone nine years. Willis was okay playing another cop. Scott was fucking annoying as hell. Why was he there?

This movie didn’t know what it was supposed to be. It is supposed to be a buddy comedy? Is it supposed to be a gritty action flick? Is it supposed to be a parody of those movies? I was left bewildered by the end. This is on par with the Project Greenlight made movie to me.

Judgment: This movie fails on every single level.

Rating: *1/2