John Ashton, Eddie Murphy, and Judge Reinhold in ‘Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F’ (2023)
Synopsis
How do you kick off the fourth iteration of the Beverley Hills Cop franchise? Play it safe. Start with a chase, of course.
Axel Foley (Eddie Murphy) and a fellow Detroit policeman interrupt a heist at a hockey game. And guess what. They have to pursue the bad guys through crowded city streets. In a commandeered snow plow, no less. Excessive automotive carnage ensues. Which gets Axel’s boss, Jeffrey Friedman (Paul Reiser), booted from his job.
None of this has much to do with the rest of the movie.
Instead, next up, Axel gets a call from his old pal Billy Rosewood (Judge Reinhold) out in Los Angeles, warning him that his daughter (wait, Axel has a daughter?) is in danger because of a case they’re working together. Jane Saunders (Taylour Paige) is a lawyer defending an accused cop killer. She believes he’s been framed, but when Billy goes looking for the missing proof, he goes missing as well.
And that’s the plot device that propels Axel back to his old Los Angeles stomping grounds. Where his stomping around immediately lands him in trouble with the LAPD, giving him the convenient opportunity to reconnect with Chief John Taggart (John Ashton), who yells at him just as he did in previous installments. He also gets to meet his daughter’s ex-boyfriend, Detective Bobby Abbott (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), a clean-cut, do-it-by-the book nice guy.
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So that’s it. The rest is some not very inventive police work uncovering the doings of a dirty cop (who you can spot the second he’s introduced). There are father-daughter fights, which provide Murphy a brief moment for emotional reflection, which quickly passes. There are more routinely staged chases with more automotive carnage, which becomes ridiculously repetitive and tedious. Bad guys who can’t shoot. Goofy, stereotypical Los Angeles characters for queasy comedic relief. The callbacks to previous quirky characters, like Serge (Bronson Pinchot), are sadly anemic.
If you’re a fan of the first two 80s hits, and Eddie Murphy in particular, you’ll enjoy this romp. Go ahead, by my guest. But Axel F is just not nearly as fresh and gut-splittingly funny, no matter how nostalgic you are for the originals. Eddie Murphy obviously relishes the chance to replay Axel, but the occasional hearty chuckles are only the product of his explosive ad-libs, which are adrift in an otherwise deflated script.
Yes, Taylour Paige and Joseph Gordon-Levitt hold up their part of the story. But although it may sound unfair, 30 years past the unfortunate third installment, the supporting crew of Reiser, Reinhold, Ashton, and Pinchot are simply pudgier, slower, and not much better at acting.
The best part? The soundtrack, which harks back to the original. We get to hear snatches of “The Heat Is On,” “Shakedown,” and “Neutron Dance,” which makes us only all the more sad when we weigh this latest respin against the original hits.