WHY I BOUGHT IT

Spoilers for Beverly Hills Cop to follow.

Beverly Hills Cop is a banger of a movie for many reasons. The film’s tone is note perfect; an action comedy that’s laugh out loud funny AND has a story, characters and villains that would feel right at home in any other straight forward 80s cop movie. The action is clean and well shot (OG stunt work just hits different), and there is even one particular single take sequence in the first five minutes of the film that works as both a comedy set piece and a tension filled set up. Director Martin Brest (Midnight Run, Scent of a Woman) fills the cast (both good guys and bad) with memorable character actors who all do great work and again, would feel very comfortable in any other 80s action flick. In short, Beverly Hills Cop is, top to bottom, a well made and memorable action comedy.

It just also happens to feature Eddie Murphy becoming a full blown sensation right before your very eyes.

Just like in 48 HRS, Eddie commands the screen every second of this movie. No joke, his performance as Axel Foley is one of the greatest Movie Star moments in all of Hollywood, and watching it again for the first time in years, I’m simply in awe. Eddie is so effortlessly funny yet always completely believable, whether he is fast talking a goon while undercover or trying to sneak into a posh members only restaurant to bother and annoy the main bad guy. The film stops dead in its tracks multiple times to just let Eddie go off, and it is worth every second. Almost all of the bits are just as funny as they were almost 40 years ago, and it’s all because of Eddie.

Judge Reinhold and John Ashton both are hilarious foils for Eddie to bounce off of as the pair of cops (un)lucky enough to baby sit Eddie while he stirs up trouble around their turf. Reinhold is the naive rookie and Ashton is the tough but fair old timer, and both have excellent chemistry with Murphy, enough so that you actually believe these guys are friends when all is said and done.

But it’s Bronson Pinchot who with only a few minutes of screen time steals all of Eddie’s heat every second he appears. If you’ve seen it, you know, and if you haven’t, what is wrong with you?

I think what really makes Beverly Hills Cop a cut above the rest though is the fact that Axel Foley is a full blown character. Again, just like in 48 HRS, Murphy proves he can fit the aesthetic as well as get the laughs. He’s obviously funny, yes, but he is also tough as nails and smarter than every person in any given room. Axel also drives an A+ shitty car, a staple of any good movie cop. Even Axel’s reasoning for causing all this havoc in Beverly Hills rather than his native Detroit is to solve the murder of his childhood friend which gives the character a perfect revenge story, and Eddie nails every character beat, whether he is mining for laughs or talking cop business, and the result is a fully realized character that everyone and their mom is rooting for.

Why did I buy Beverly Hills Cop? Because it’s legit one of the funniest and entertaining action comedies ever made. The movie as a whole is firing on all cylinders, but Eddie Murphy’s icon making performance turns this into one of the biggest and best pop culture phenomenons of all time (the movie was number 1 at the domestic box office 13 weeks in a row). This all seems so obvious now, but again I find myself also asking “Why the hell haven’t I watched this in so long?” It looks like that is just going to be a question that lingers throughout this column, but I will say that it’s been a joy so far reconnecting with these old favorites, as I seem to have forgotten that they are indeed favorites. I don’t know, maybe I’m just an idiot who buys too many movies, but damnit, I like movies. And so the addiction continues.