Police Academy/Police Academy 2

Police Academy (1984)

Runtime: 96 minutes

Directed by: Hugh Wilson

Starring: I presume everyone knows who starred in these movies

From: Warner Bros./The Ladd Company

Police Academy 2: Their First Assignment (1985)

Runtime: 87 minutes

Directed by: Jerry Paris

Starring: I presume everyone knows who starred in these movies

From: Warner Bros./The Ladd Company

Yep, I saw these two movies last night. I saw both as a kid but I haven't watched them since sometime in my teenage years, meaning “a very long time ago”. I explain how I came across a set of all 7 in the franchise... on Blu-ray, and that is below in my Letterboxd reviews for both fine prestigious motion pictures:

I realize I haven't been too active on this site for the past week aside from liking various reviews and making a few comments on other people's reviews. I either haven't felt like or haven't had the time to watch anything. Well, now I should be more back in the swing of things.

The reason behind me seeing this movie is that as a kid I saw all of the Police Academy movies, including this R-rated original and even the atrocious Mission to Moscow. I hadn't watched any of them in many years. Well, I looked online and saw that there was a UK release of all the movies on Blu-ray but Amazon said it was region free and thankfully Amazon was correct. Considering that renting all 7 films on Amazon Video would only be slightly less than what I paid for the physical movies on Blu, it seemed like a good purchase. Seeing UK and Irish ratings on the Blu labels for the front of the disc is different for a Dumb American like me. Plus, George Gaynes unfortunately passed away recently and of course he played the bumbling Commandant Lassard.

I presume most are familiar with the general story and the main characters so I won't dwell on that. We follow some bumbling new cop recruits; now, they are rather broad stereotypes but at least they are memorable. Mahoney comes off as an asstagonist most of the time but the other characters are fine. Now, in 2016 seeing both a Reagan-loving military gun nut as a cop & a racist police officer using slurs that I won't repeat here... that seems more awkward now than it did then. Thankfully, the “Blue Oyster Club” moments aren't as gross as they could be. It's a sanitized version of the “gay leather bars” from Cruising, but all the clientele do is dance with some dopey straight men. In any case, the movie's pretty goofy and silly and yet I can still rate it as “fine”.

Even with the seemingly required racism, sexism and homophobia that you expect in an 80's film, it's still entertaining to me and not only are there laughs throughout, but it was nice to see those characters again, from Lassard and the giant Hightower to Michael Winslow and his sound effects (I have no idea how he does it) & the antagonist Harris. Of course I remembered various aspects (such as “MOVE IT, MOVE IT, MOVE IT!”) but other things certainly made more sense as an adult. Overall, I knew not to take this too seriously; after all, this is a motion picture where someone goes flying horizontally and they literally end up with their head stuck up a horse's ass! Also, it's a movie that's obviously filmed in Toronto (among other things you see the spelling “Centre” and an Ontario license plate can clearly be spotted early on) yet it's supposed to be “an American city”.

It's a shame that the current Hollywood studio system is so screwed up in many ways, including movies being stuck in Development Hell for many years, a proposed 8th film in this franchise being one of them. Several members of the cast have passed away now and it's a shame that this admittedly zany series can't end with a reunion and we may be stuck with the God-awful Mission to Moscow as the last one; wait until I review that, which won't be for many months.

Now, the first sequel:

Earlier in the day (shortly after the site came up from being down and inoperative) I posted a review for the first Police Academy; I got the entire franchise in a Blu set imported from the UK but it was region free. Last night I saw both the original and this movie back to back, as 2 was one I did not see that often as a kid.

The second was more of the same; you have broad stereotypical characters, goofy humor-jokes about hairy palms and glue in someone's hair-laughs from such things as “a body cavity search”, bad puns... yet I can still say it's average. The plot here is that our heroes end up in “the worst precinct” in Los Angeles... I mean the random city this is set in (it's obvious this time that it was filmed in California; the blue and yellow license plates of the time was noted by nerdy me) and they not only have to deal with a Lieutenant (Art Metrano, who did a very good job of playing a real A-hole/brown-noser) who wishes to become a Captain so he undermines said Captain, but also what Hollywood thinks were “80's punks”, a gang led by Bobcat Goldthwait, who acted like he did back then, meaning “like he was on drugs, constantly making weird noises and saying bizarre things.” From when he started directing until now, it's still amazing to me that HE became a director of some renown; I never could have predicted such a thing.

The movie is pretty dopey and sometimes makes zero logical sense. Still, even with some politically incorrect material, this is an alright picture. There are some genuine laughs throughout, and some nice slapstick. The ending isn't as spectacular as it could have been but you can't win them all. And hey, the gun nut Tackleberry is revealed as a virgin (insert your own jokes if you wish) and he finds a gal who thinks the same way that he does. It was also nice to see the bungling Proctor kiss-ass character make his debut here. I remember that no matter who his superior was he was entertaining in a real juvenile way.

It'll likely be awhile before I see another movie in this series. I remember them being all similar to I should watch them only once in awhile.