TheRetroCritic

Some time before the Beethoven movies took the whole slobbering dog movie concept to mindless levels while, at the same time, making an immortal musical icon synonymous with drool, we got both K-9 and Turner & Hooch  the same year. Produced by Disney, the 1989 film starred Tom Hanks as a neat police investigator stuck with taking care of rambunctious dog Hooch after its owner is suddenly murdered. Turner (Hanks) sets off on a search for the culprits but, first, he has to turn his life upside-down looking after his new slobbering pet. Of course, this leads to several scenes in which the dog destroys every inch of Turner's house much to the cop's horror. Hanks is reliably good as Turner and he elevates a role that, in lesser hands, could have easily fallen flat. Hooch (real name Beasley) is every bit as destructive and messy as you'd expect but the titular characters still bond and the movie makes that relationship convincing. In fact, we spend probably a bit too mu

One year before Die Hard , a little film called Lethal Weapon came out and gave us a solid mix of 80's cop action and Christmas spirit. The film spawned several sequels, of course, and became one of the action franchises to follow. But how does the very first film hold up? Probably the darkest film in the franchise, Lethal Weapon focuses more on Riggs' (Mel Gibson) depression and Murtaugh's (Danny Glover) family life than the actual crime plot at hand, which almost feels like a subplot at times. The villains, Gary Busey's Joshua, a tough ex-army guy turned ruthless killer, and Mitch Ryan's General do pop up now and then, offering the odd action beat but all in all, this first film is more of a character piece about the slow building of an unlikely friendship. A lot of emphasis is put on Riggs' suicidal state following the death of his wife as we see him get dangerously close to killing himself and almost jeopardising various cases. Luckily, he's

That Cop Out was so poorly received upon its release and became more well known for Kevin Smith's falling out with Bruce Willis than anything else is, frankly, a bit of a shame. Originally titled "A Couple Of Dicks" , Cop Out was meant to be a throwback buddy cop comedy in the vein of the Lethal Weapon series. Bruce Willis being the tough cop and Tracy Morgan being the goofy sidekick. The two cops are suspended after one of their cases goes stupidly wrong and this puts Jimmy (Willis) in a bind since he was planning to pay for his daughter's wedding instead of her irritating stepdad (played by Jason Lee). They find themselves getting back on the case since it coincides with Jimmy' lost pricy baseball card. Sean-William Scott pops up in what would have been the Jason Mewes role as a mouthy petty thief and he very nearly steals the show. Kevin Pollak does a good job as one of the rival cops from the station and Guillermo Diaz makes an intimidating villain, as

Sean Connery doesn't f*** around. Even in space, he gets the job done. In this Jupiter moon mining colony-set sci-fi flick, Connery plays a police marshal who shows up there and starts investigating a drug-smuggling conspiracy. The people there don't help him at all, leaving him on his own to sort everything out but tension mounts when he is marked for death and murders start occurring around him. Yes, Outland is essentially The French Connection ... IN SPACE. Take a 70's cop movie, set it on Jupiter's moon, add Sean Connery and you've got yourself Outland. The movie doesn't really need to be set in space or to be sci-fi at all but the fact that the people involved in the plot have literally nowhere to run does add tension and a sense of isolation to the proceedings. It's a slow-burning movie that demands for you to be immersed in that atmosphere, in that world. This isn't the typical slick, overtly futuristic science fiction movie you'd exp

Back in the day, Michael Keaton managed to fit this little flick in between Batman movies. One Good Cop isn't quite the big blockbuster you'd expect the man, The Bat-man, to take on but cop movies were in vogue so why not? The film sees Keaton and Anthony LaPaglia as NYPD cops, the former is married (to Rene Russo, typecast as a cop's wife in EVERYTHING back in the day), the latter is father to three kids, they follow various cases which always end up getting pretty messy. One day, Keaton's partner gets killed recklessly and he is left trying to deal with the best way to give his kids a new home. One Good Cop isn't so much a cop movie as it is a rough-edged melodrama with cops in it. A lot of emphasis is put on literally every character around Keaton so it's hard to pin his down, which means that when he finally does something completely out of character it's pretty jarring. The film's trying to tell this emotional story of a cop, a good guy with

Sure cop movies are cool but... you know what else is cool? Freakin' robots that's what. Good thing the 80's knew that, otherwise we wouldn't have been able to enjoy Paul Verhoeven's RoboCop , a film with a premise so awesome it must have taken about a minute to greenlight. Peter Weller, of Buckaroo Banzai "fame", is Murphy, the Detroit cop who gets his ass handed to him in a particularly unfriendly gun-fight. What's left of him is soon turned into a badass robotic crimefighter with an apt for genius one-liners and incredible shooting accuracy. Sadly, his hardware is owned by corrupt company OCP which makes ridding the city of all its scum a bit of a challenge. The "scum" in question includes big cheese Dick Jones (the ever intimidating Ronny Cox), the dad from That 70's Show and... Leland Palmer? Twin Peaks reference. It's funny, go watch the show. So yes, it turns out that having the police owned by a big-ass,

Robert Downey Jr should be in every movie. Even as an extra or something: just there. His impressive comeback is no huge surprise in that he is one of the best actors working today but it is very welcome. A film like Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, without him, would no doubt had been forgotten and left for dead...especially with THAT title! Thankfully though, there's life in this old dog yet. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang stars Downey Jr as a petty thief turned actor turned detective who gets entangled in a twisted Raymond Chandler-style story that's actually kind of hard to follow...but then again so was The Big Sleep . We're introduced to this world by a terrific self-conscious voiceover courtesy of Downey Jr himself and although the film's unique tongue-in-cheek style is a tad jarring at first you soon get into it and join the gang on their wacky adventure. The film itself is stylish, fun, clever, entertaining and very funny. Downey Jr and Val Kilmer make a good double act as they

After the cop out that was... Cop Out , it's Adam McKay's turn to give us his take on the old buddy pictures of the 80s. On paper, The Other Guys should have been glorious but, as funny as it is throughout, there is still something missing. Perhaps it prioritizes jokes rather than focus on the cop genre it's riffing off a bit too much, perhaps the shaky-cam and modern feel of the film takes away some of the nostalgia we have come to expect from those classic cop movies. Having said that, Will Ferrell is always fun and Mark Wahlberg is great proving once again that comedy really is his calling as opposed to drama, which he can barely do (as his previous 3 efforts have conclusively proven). The supporting cast is also spot on with Michael Keaton's TLC quoting captain almost stealing the show. Alas the film tires in the last half hour and the whole thing becomes very hit and miss. The jokes wear thin and you end up missing the film's first half. Still, The Other