Cop Out

As a rule, I enjoy Kevin Smith. He is a fellow fattie, a regular dude who made it big and gets to do what many of us would love to do – make funny movies and earn lots of money doing it. He makes more of an effort to connect with his fan base than pretty much anyone I’ve ever seen and he really seems to understand that while he has worked extremely hard to get where he is, he is lucky to be there. Zack and Miri Make a Porno, Chasing Amy and Dogma are absolute gifts to movie goers. If you haven’t seen them, get off your ass and go get me some cake. Seriously, I’m hungry and I have a sweet tooth. I’ll tell you about the movies when you get back.

Cop Out is the first movie Smith has directed that he didn’t also write. This is no cause for celebration because he is a phenomenal writer. Robb and Mark Cullen, who did write this movie, are not even close to his level. Billy Connolly once said in an interview that he curses a lot in his stand up because it has a nice rhythm when you do it right. You see evidence of that in Smith’s own screenplays, but that particular bit of wisdom was not imparted upon the Cullens. This movie has problems - chief among them was the writing. It didn’t feel entirely worked through, like they filmed a rough draft hoping they could fill the holes as they went.

The story is convoluted, but this is a buddy comedy – story is a vehicle to move from joke to joke. For this movie to work, one needs to ask: 1. Are the jokes funny? 2. Are the people who are telling me the jokes funny? This is where personal preference comes in. I find Tracey Morgan hilarious. He is batshit crazy and shouts his lines like a 6 year old on a sugar rush. A lot of people I talk to find him annoying as fuck so they will frigging hate this film. Seann Williams Scott is great in the 12-14 minutes of screen time he actually gets.

Know who sucks big giant hairy balls though? Bruce Willis. Bruce fucking Willis is painful to watch all the way through this movie. He isn’t funny, most of the time he is barely amusing. The scene with Jason Lee discussing who will pay for his daughter’s marriage was one of the most poorly written and amateurish scenes I have ever seen. The scene with Fred Armisen? Fucking painful to watch. His part was terribly written and acted with a Kristen Stewart-esque awkwardness that actually made me feel a bit embarrassed for the guy.

Speaking of embarrassing, the guys in the Mexican drug gang. I still don’t know what Smith was going for. I know what I saw – overacting. They weren’t funny. They weren’t scary. Their presence certainly added conflict and urgency for Willis, but they were so poorly executed ... it would have been so much funnier had they gotten rid of them altogether and just made Scott the film’s sole obstacle to Willis’ quest to pawn that baseball card.

I’ve seen this twice – once on the big screen and once on the small screen. It doesn’t hold up to multiple viewings I’m afraid. I laughed a fair bit the first time I saw it. Not so much the second time. Unlike Zack and Miri, which makes me laugh every single time I watch it. I do not think this is Smith’s worst movie, and because I am a fan of his and I enjoy Tracey Morgan and Seann Williams Scott, I will probably rate this higher than most other people would.

I rate Cop Out 5 out of 10