Police Academy 5: Assignment Miami Beach

Police Academy 5: Assignment Miami Beach (1988)

Runtime: 90 minutes

Directed by: Alan Myerson

Starring: The usual Police Academy cast, plus Matt McCoy and Rene Auberjonois

From: Warner Bros.

It's been awhile since I've seen one of these. It's not great but I still think this one was watchable. The sixth and seventh ones... from what I remember those will be painful, but I'll review them in the (possibly distant) future. For now, some brief thoughts about this movie, as there isn't too much to say about it:

I hadn't seen a Police Academy movie since last June. It wasn't that I wanted to prolong seeing this... it was more like me not wanting to go through the franchise too fast... and being incredibly wary of 6 and 7, which I did not even like as a kid, which is why I only saw them once each, many years ago. While this was the first time that Steve Guttenberg was not part of the series, I can still say this is average. At least Matt McCoy was OK as the obvious stand-in.

The plot revolves around the whole crew going to Miami Beach, as Commandant Lassard is being honored with an award, although he also has to retire due to old age. Via circumstances straight out of a sitcom, he ends up with the wrong luggage and that's bad, as that luggage contains stolen diamonds, so the buffoon crooks want them back. The movie is exactly what you expect from all the main characters, from Proctor being as dimwitted as ever to Hightower displaying his great height and strength, Hooks speaking real soft until she yells real loud, people ogling at Callahan's large breasts, etc. The same goes for the plot and various events that typically happen in these movies.

It's all very silly and juvenile. Yet despite how dumb it is, I still found it to be watchable and thus, it gets an average rating. I laughed at some of the humor and the action stuff you see is not bad. It's a movie where a gun-nut cop that wears a Dirty Harry t-shirt pulls a gun on a shark approaching a beach... and the shark swims away. There's not a whole lot else you can say about such a motion picture, so I won't.