Review: Beverly Hills Cop - Axel F
The Fourth Film In The Eddie Murphy 'Beverly Hills Cop' Franchise
INTRODUCTION
This is a quick review of the newly released film Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F. Keep in mind this is but one of the many movies I watch every year, and that whatever initial grade I come up for this film could change for better or worse with time. To better keep up to date with both my thoughts on other movies and if my feelings on this film changed, follow me on Letterboxd.
I’d also appreciate it greatly if you spread the word about the newsletter to any family or friends who would love to have film reviews, classic movie lists, and Oscars projections delivered straight to their inbox.
THE PLOT
Via Letterboxd: Forty years after his unforgettable first case in Beverly Hills, Detroit cop Axel Foley returns to do what he does best - solve crimes and cause chaos.
QUICK REVIEW
The eighties seem like all the rage when it comes to the recent flavor of nostalgia. As I write this review for a fourth movie in a franchise born in the eighties, I’m also scheduled to go see a movie set in the eighties later tonight (Bonus written review incoming for that one as well).
That franchise is of course the Beverly Hills Cop franchise that spawn two hit eighties classics and a much derided 1994 third installment (In fact there’s an inside joke in this fourth part about said third film). And unlike many others I never got the chance to catch up to the Eddie Murphy lead action comedy flicks, so I figured it’d be no better time than now to finally fix those blind spots. So I went ahead and binged the three previous movies yesterday and then caught the new one this morning.
I ended up really liking and having fun with the first two films, and to my (somewhat) surprise I actually enjoyed the third one though its easily the weakest of the series. If I had to boil down as to why that last one is so unpopular, I’d have to say that the first two had an aesthetic to it that really pushed the comedic and more fun parts of these movies forward. Where as the third is hampered by a more nineties aesthetic that doesn’t seem to fit the franchise and leans into more tense action that comedy (And one comedic bit in that movie runs way too long). But having really liked the first two and thinking the third was decent but not great, which of the two halves would the new Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F be?
I’m happy to say that the fourth film in the series leans much more heavily into the aesthetic and fun of the first two, and less of the faults of the third one. Now keep in mind I’m one of the few that actually had fun with another Eddie Murphy lead legacy sequel in Coming 2 America, so take my thoughts with a grain of salt. But I truly had a blast with this new Axel Foley adventure and was struck by how much it re-created the feel of the original movies while still being set in modern times.
There’s some fan favorites that return, and though some of them felt forced back into the fold after their whereabouts were elsewhere for the third film, regardless they’re a welcomed sight. Judge Reinhold isn’t really around much and he’s missed, but he does his best with his few scenes. John Ashton was a surprise to see and I liked how they turned him into a gruff, skeptical police chief that is all once mailing it in, and thus the inevitable redemption of him returning to form by the end. I also wasn’t expecting Paul Riser to show up again, but he does provide a service in his few scenes.
New additions, particularly Foley’s daughter played by Taylour Paige and her ex-boyfriend Cop played by Joseph Gordon-Levitt, provide an extra layer to this that made it feel like it was more than just a mindless exercise in seeing Eddie Murphy back in Axel’s jacket. The father/daughter dynamic between Murphy and Paige and the quasi buddy cop pair of Murphy and Gordon-Levitt made this stand out to me compared to the others, even as it maintained the magic of the first two films. While the villain could have been written better (Like they could have been in the other three as well) Kevin Bacon does his best with what is given and plays menacing well.
The comedy is also thankfully very good, getting me to laugh out loud various times; and its also referential to the age of the original ensemble without feeling like a “why can’t we do this anymore like the good old non-woke days!” shtick that it could have leaned into. The soundtrack is also top-notch and arguably among the best of the year.
All in all, where the third movie failed to match the look and feel of the first two, Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F does even though it takes place a whole forty years after the first instalment. It’s a good time to be had on your couch when you fire up Netflix for a movie night. I give it a solid B+.
INITIAL GRADING
