21 Jump Street
2012
***½
Director: Phil Lord, Christopher Miller
Cast: Jonah Hill, Channing Tatum, Brie Larson, Dave Franco, Rob Riggle, DeRay Davis, Ice Cube, Chris Parnell, Ellie Kemper, Jake Johnson
Due to their youthful looks and immature behaviour, two second-rate rookie cops are reassigned to a special unit which sends them undercover in a high school to find the source of a lethal synthetic drug. 21 Jump Street was a TV show that ran from 1987 to 1991 and made Johnny Depp a household name. Like Charlie's Angels and Starsky & Hutch, this big screen adaptation turns a crime procedural into an all-out comedy. Whether someone is shot or stabbed, I'm meant to laugh, and I do. Like most current comedies, the humour relies heavily on coarse language and crude gags. but the script generates some genuinely funny moments by reversing Hill and Tatum's initial roles and throwing them in a high school environment which is drastically different from the one they remember. Followed by 22 Jump Street.
