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Can a buddy-cop parody still qualify as a good buddy-cop movie?
Showtime struggles to prove it's possible, and with a few solid laughs it
almost succeeds. No movie starring Eddie Murphy and Robert De Niro could be a total turkey, and their pairing--as (respectively) a brash patrol cop/wannabe actor and a seasoned detective with zero tolerance for showmanship--yields a few choice moments of slick, professional comedy. Still, most of
Showtime represents a missed opportunity, squandering Rene Russo's talent as a TV producer who casts Murphy and De Niro in a buddy-cop reality show that turns them into overnight celebrities. In an effort to repeat the modest success of
Shanghai Noon, director Tom Dey capitalizes on the casual chemistry of his leads (especially Murphy, who outshines his costars) until parody succumbs to routine action involving big guns and bad guys. With a sharper sense of satire, this passable entertainment could have been a comedy juggernaut.
--Jeff Shannon
Eddie Murphy, betraying his "Beverly Hills Cop" past, and Robert De Niro, continuing his comedic career swing, send up the buddy-cop movie. Although they click well in a few scenes, they're no Starsky and Hutch. After a botched drug bust, they get picked for a reality television show ("The Real World" meets "Cops"), and the script devotes a lot of time to the underwhelming observation that we act differently when we're on camera. Much of the humor is too self-referential-jokes with footnotes-and the whole production feels a bit halfhearted. The thugs are the movie's only real triumph: hirsute, club-hopping Eastern Europeans with guns that shoot bullets the size of soda cans. -Michael Agger
Copyright © 2006
The New Yorker
