A laugh-out loud comedy hit from directing team Phil Lord & Chris Miller, 21 Jump Street revives the 80s TV show about two hapless cops who are sent undercover in a high school due to their youthful looks.
The surprising chemistry between unlikely co-stars Channing Tatum and Jonah Hill keeps the fun coming in this movie: one time high school enemies, they become friends at police academy and seem to have grown out of their differences. When they fail to properly arrest their first target, they are sent to Jump Street, a police division for young-looking officers to carry out undercover operations.
What they find, on return to school, is that the game has very much changed. Social groups are different, achievement is celebrated rather than being mocked “Look at him, he’s trying…” and the kids are doing a new form of drug, which has recently caused the death of a student at the school. Jenko and Schmidt (Tatum and Hill) are sent in to find the supply and dealer, and along the way, they make friends, get in with the dealers, and discover talents they never knew they had. Channing Tatum in a chemistry lab and Jonah Hill in a Peter Pan costume? Wonders will never cease. With their new identities, it’s a struggle for the two to keep their minds on the job, and eventually Schmidt’s new ‘cool’ status threatens to rip their partnership, and the case, apart.
Despite all reservations I had about the quality of this movie and its ability to make me laugh, I came out teary eyed from chuckling and quoted lines from the film all the way home. It’s a thoroughly enjoyable farce, with frequent laughs, tongue-in-cheek and without a doubt the best cameo I have seen so far this year. Who’s the cameo? Watch it and see.
*****
By Stephanie Broad
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