A comedy has one job—to make you laugh—and if it fires off a gag a minute and you only chuckle a handful of times, it isn’t working. By that barometer, the new Naked Gun reboot, starring Liam Neeson in the deadpan Police Squad! mode Leslie Nielsen patented four decades ago, just doesn’t land. It tries hard to revive the anything-goes silliness of the originals, but the spark isn’t there. The jokes just aren’t as sharp.
Maybe the difference this time is that the legendary comedy trio of David Zucker, Jerry Zucker, and Jim Abrahams—who made the three original films (along with Airplane!, Top Secret!, and Hot Shots)—had no hand in it. Abrahams passed away last year, and the Zuckers supposedly stepped aside, though David Zucker did write his own screenplay that never got produced.
Director Akira Schafer co-wrote the script with Dan Gregor and Doug Mand, then cast Liam Neeson as Frank Drebin Jr., son of the Nielsen character, with Pamela Anderson as the comic femme fatale and Danny Huston as the villain bent on (sort of) world domination. There’s plenty of talent here, but while you get a few clever bits and maybe three sequences that really land, too many gags fall flat. A lot of them are groaners, nowhere close to laugh-out-loud funny.
The picture opens with the clueless Drebin doing his best to live up to his dad’s towering Police Squad! legacy. Neeson, playing against type, is goofy fun—no small thing for a serious dramatic actor who’s spent the last decade as an action hero. Here his lighter touch is a real surprise, and he clearly knows his way around a joke. Paired with his equally clueless partner (Paul Walter Hauser), the two bumble through early scenes until CCH Pounder, playing the no-nonsense division chief, benches him.
Before that, though, he crosses paths with Beth Davenport—Pamela Anderson, playing it straight in the Priscilla Presley (who has a split-second cameo) but also with a knowing wink. She’s game, she’s funny, and a scene where she suddenly launches into a smoky jazz number is a riot. It’s also just plain fun to see Anderson, who was solid in Gia Coppola’s The Last Showgirl earlier this year, getting a deserved second act.
As for the plot, it’s the usual ridiculousness: electric car megalomaniac entrepreneur (got it!) Richard Cane (Danny Huston) wants to take over the world using technology, pitting the public against itself. In the opening sequence he stages a bank robbery, though the opening gag with Frank in a little girl costume is a dud. Beth’s late brother was tangled in the scheme, and soon she and Frank are both partners and love interests—giving the movie its best moments.
One bit has a would-be assassin using an infrared scope on Frank’s apartment, only to misinterpret what he sees as a wild sex scene involving Frank, Beth, and the dog. Later, the couple gets a full-blown romantic montage set to Starship’s “Nothing’s Gonna Stop Us Now”—overly cheerful, silly, and then completely deranged once a jealous snowman tries to sabotage their wintry chalet tryst. Both scenes work, and they’re terrific.
When the credits roll at just 74 minutes, the movie signs off with a final, fourth-wall gag that doesn’t land. That’s pretty much the story here, no matter how likable the cast might be. Some things are obvious—a stray O.J. Simpson joke—and some just fall flat, like an owl bit that goes nowhere and a Buffy the Vampire Slayer reference. A few gross-outs hit better: there’s a gas passing sequence that proves lowbrow humor still works when done right. And there’s a funny running gag about a self-driving car. There are hundreds more, which I’m sure someone, somewhere has catalogued. Overall, this is a good-natured (not quite the same as good) throwaway that made me grin in lieu of laugh.
For a Naked Gun movie, that’s a letdown.
2 stars
