It takes a lot of smarts to make an effective “dumb” comedy. This is something that director David Zucker knew when he made 1980’s Airplane and 1988’s The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad!, which was an adaptation of the series Police Squad! that he created with Jim Abrahams and Jerry Zucker, and other iconic cinematic comedies. For all the seemingly silly humour in his films, the jokes were often genius in their construction.
A spoof of police procedurals, The Naked Gun, and the two sequels it spawned, were filled with visual gags and sharp one-liners that often felt as silly as its dimwitted protagonist. However, when one takes a step back, the level of detail and planning for each joke came into clear view. Juvenile enough to appeal to kids, but sharp enough to evoke belly laughs from adults, the film hit a sweet spot that many comedies only wished they could achieve.
Anchored by the late Leslie Nielsen’s wonderful turn as hard-boiled detective Frank Drebin, The Naked Gun franchise really captured a time when comedies simply wanted to bring people together to laugh.
In an era where studios consider comedies risky theatrical ventures, opting to dump them straight to streaming platforms, Akiva Schaffer’s The Naked Gun reboot finds itself wading into uncertain waters. It is a film that unabashedly harkens back to a time long gone, while simultaneously taking pointed shots at the fallacies of our modern times.
Choosing to dance to its own drum, rather than sway to the music of conformity, Schaffer’s film delivers plenty of belly inducing laughs.
Stepping into the renowned shoes of Drebin, albeit as the son of Nielsen’s character, Liam Neeson is wonderful as a man who is as relentless when it comes to solving crimes as he is about ensuring his hand always has a cup of coffee. Partnered with Ed Hocken Jr. (Paul Walter Hauser), the son of his dad’s old partner, Drebin Jr. is the type of cop who is a dying breed. He believes manliness means executing his job with as much force as possible and sorting out the pieces later.
Drebin Jr.’s tough guy machismo is put to the test when his latest murder case has him crossing paths with the victim’s beautiful sister Beth Davenport (Pamela Anderson). A widower himself, the famed police officer must balance his growing feelings for Davenport and his desire to uncover how an electric car tech mogul, Richard Cane (Danny Huston), is involved in the case. As with previous incarnations of the film, the plot is merely a device to get to the jokes which flow at a fast clip.
While Neeson, Anderson, and company do a fantastic job selling various gags, it is the things that Schaffer’s film takes aim at that will have audiences clutching their stomach in laughter. The biggest one being the misguided notion of masculinity that the Elon Musks and Andrew Tates of the world promote. Taking clear satirical jabs at Musk, a popular punching bag this summer, if one factors in Superman and to a lesser extent Bad Guys 2, The Naked Gun has plenty of fun pointing out how the fragile those who preach the gospel of manliness really are.
Unafraid to poke fun at a wide range of topics from police brutality to celebrities accused of sexual assault, there are plenty of jokes to satisfy all comedic tastes. A refreshing comedy that never pulls its punches, The Naked Gun is the one of the year’s pleasant surprises.
