10/08/2012: 21 Jump Street [2012]

I was disappointed with myself when, after 15 minutes of looking at my collection of amazing movies I need to watch, I couldn't fight off the urge to watch 21 Jump Street. All my movies, and I chose the new comedy about a pair of cops who go undercover at a high school to uncover the source of a new drug. Well they were undercover and they uncovered that I really enjoyed this.

 

I'm not completely sure why I felt I shouldn't like this movie, but I think it is because it's target audience was probably targeted towards high school teenagers and I think it would have been a challenge to ever get me to go see this in a theater. However, it did pretty well in the ratings and I felt like a comedy. I had actually just watched a few comedies, Young Frankenstein and Jeff Who Lives at Home, but comedies come in so many different flavours and styles I figure the combination of the three covers a wide enough range of comedies for a while.

21 Jump Street is actually a movie reboot of an old T.V. series of the same name. Aside from working in a fantastic fucking cameo, 21 Jump Street does a great job rebooting the old series to fit in better with current times as well as priming itself for the obvious sequel. By that I don't mean the movie doesn't wrap up or leaves itself open ended. It does tie up all of it's strings, but of course gives us the scene indicating that a sequel is a completely viable option. Personally, I'm looking forward to it, even though it might be a few years.

Oh. High school.

As for the rebooting aspect, I think it lent itself to some of the funniest aspects of the entire movie. When movies, especially comedies, portray highschool it is like they have a template already set out. Tough jocks who drive muscle cars and don't care about anything are the cool kids and the smart nerdy kids get beat up and never get the girl. I'd say I was on the tail end of this era, as were are alleged buddy cops. So when they return to current highschool society (is society excessive? maybe ecosystem) prepared for the old status quo they get a hilarious surprise. Apparently now highschool students care about things like the environment, and studying and whatnot. While that may seem like an improvement, they are all taking drug somewhere up there with acid or LCD, so don't worry, they are more messed up than the good old days.

Overall, I'd say that the update on the highschool environement was probably the funniest aspect of the whole movie, and it makes up a good portion of it as well. The other half of the movie, as well as it's plot is made up of buddy cop movie. Now, buddy cop movies have been done to death, and a couple of years ago, when we dealt with Cop Out and The Other Guys I thought we might have seen the last of them for a while. However, 21 Jump Street breathes some fresh air into it. Mainly by taking the buddy cop relationship and throwing it into a completely different environment and it works both ways. Watching Channing Tatum and Jonah Hill try and fit in is hilarious, but high school also gets a lot funnier when the pair are armed to the teeth and throwing parties. I love the scene when they discuss how to buy booze.

Doves. Bitches love doves.

Despite my fears 21 Jump Street doesn't get too boring. However, the movie's weakest parts might be whenever we split up the duo of Tatum and Hill and have them try and deal with their own problems. Together and happy, the pair are hilarious. Apart, it is just "grow up already" and do we always have to deal with these relationship problems because we all know it is going to work out in the end. Aside from that though, Tatum and Hill make for a great comedy buddy cop duo and without them I wouldn't be looking forward to a sequel. Jonah Hill had a hard time convincing Tatum but in the end it was worth it. Echoing what I said on comedic actors in my other post, Jonah Hill actually wrote the story to 21 Jump Street as well and I think we can expect some great comedies from him in the future. Until he goes the way of Will Ferrel however.

The rest of the cast is okay, but I'm not a big fan of Ice Cube and I'm a little tired of that guy who played the coach. Dave Franco rather grates on my nerves as well. Actually aside from the two stars, there is only one other person I wouldn't want recast. The rest of them I wouldn't have cared much. The other actress was Ellie Kemper who most will recognize as Erin from The Office. I thought her role was hilarious, and I was disappointed she didn't get worked in more than she did.

I wish my chemistry class was this fun.

I don't remember the soundtrack to this movie, so I don't think it was anything special. The few special effects that there are are well done. I've just really started to realize that it is comedy movie standard to feature all your bloopers and outtakes in the ending credits which, is rather smart and I enjoy it. Overall, 21 Jump Street is one of the better comedies of it's ilk to come out in the last few years. If those kind of movies are for you check it out.

 
 Link:
 21 Jump Street IMDb