Classic Movie Review Beverly Hills Cop 3

Beverly Hills Cop 3 (1994) 

Directed by John Landis 

Written by Steven E. de Souza 

Starring Eddie Murphy, Judge Reinhold, Hector Elizondo, John Saxon, Theresa Randle

Release Date May 25th, 1994

Published May 27th, 2024 

Screenwriting 101: if you want to establish that your character is heroic, show them doing something heroic. For instance, in the movie Beverly Hills Cop 3, Eddie Murphy hops aboard the Spider ride at Wonder World. The baddies want the ride stopped so they can snatch Eddie off of the ride. As they fight with the ride operator, the ride gets turned up to 11 and the machinery of the ride starts to break down. This causes one of the gondolas on the Spider ride, one carrying two young children, to come loose and begin to break off. 

Not missing a beat, our hero, Axl Foley (Eddie Murphy), leaps into action. Risking his own life, Axl climbs out of his gondola and begins leaping to the tops of other gondolas. As this happens, the ride begins to move again, nearly causing Axl to fall to his death. As Axl is climbing his way toward the broken gondola, after finding a conveniently placed length of rope, the ride stops and the chain holding the broken gondola begins to break further. Axl uses the rope to lower himself down to the door of the gondola. He pulls the kids out of the broken ride and, as he's climbing down the rope, the broken gondola finally breaks and begins to fall. Axl reaches the ground and narrowly gets himself and the kids to safety just as the gondola drops. 

The scene establishes that our protagonist is a selfless hero, a man willing to risk his life to save innocent children. Here's the problem though, this is Beverly Hills Cop 3. Two previous movies have already established that Axl Foley is a hero. We've seen Axl Foley perform heroic acts as a police officer in both Detroit and Beverly Hills in two different movies. Thus, spending a 7-to-8-minute scene re-establishing Axl's heroic nature is a gigantic waste of screen time. Sure, there's a chance that some of the audience hasn't seen the previous two Beverly Hills Cop movies before, they may not be aware of Axl's heroism. But they are seeing a movie called Beverly Hills Cop 3, they are probably aware that the main character of this third movie in a franchise is a hero in the movie they are watching. 

Bottom line, this scene is a gigantic waste of time. It's a bit of business and a not a particularly interesting one. There is no chance in hell that either Axl or the two children he's saving in this scenario, happening in the early portion of the second act, are going to die. We have no reason to worry or be tense about this moment. During this entire scene, Beverly Hills Cop 3 is spinning its wheels, it's going nowhere. We are watching a tension free action scene that has nothing to do with the plot of the movie. In fact, the movie has to place the plot on hold just to carry out this scene. The scene is deathless in length and since the outcome is assured, we have zero reason to be invested in this scenario. 

That scene I just described is a perfect microcosm of Beverly Hills Cop 3, a movie that is constantly spinning its wheels and going nowhere. It's clear from frame one to frame last that no one involved wanted to be part of this movie. Subsequently, we've learned from director John Landis and supporting actor Bronson Pinchot, that Eddie Murphy was completely checked out and had no interest in making the movie. According to both, a scene where Pinchot's character, Serge, delivers a comic monologue had to be played opposite John Landis standing in for Eddie Murphy, because Murphy could not be bothered to leave his trailer to do coverage or be there for his co-star. 

In fairness to Eddie, this monologue is entirely devoid of laughs and while it serves the purpose of introducing a weapon that Eddie will use later in the film, the weapon is a gag and not a very funny one. The weapon in question is used not in the final showdown of the movie, but as a brief, needless side quest where it malfunctions and then over-performs the task of taking out a random henchman. The gag is that the gun has a lot of needless features like a radio, a net that fails its function, and a radio that gets turned on. The song on the radio is meant to be a punchline but the song is so generic and forgettable that the joke doesn't land. 

The plot of Beverly Hills Cop 3 is not important. The movie reflects this by barely mentioning the plot. A vehicle gets stolen in Detroit and cut to Axle in Beverly Hills going to see his friend Billy Rosewood (Judge Reinhold). What made Axle go to L.A? The movie doesn't bother to tell us. It's fair to assume he was going there just from the title, but, at the very least, each of the previous movies gave Axle a reason to go to Beverly Hills via some sort of established link in the case he's investigating in Detroit. Beverly Hills Cop 3 is so lazy that the editor appears to have thrown up their hands and just cut to Axle in Beverly Hills and, oh by the way, the bad guys are here also. 

I don't need to over-egg the recipe here; Beverly Hills Cop 3 is a terrible movie. The only interesting aspect of the movie for me is related to a piece of backstage gossip. Apparently, Eddie Murphy and John Landis had a severe falling out during the making of the movie. On IMDB, they cite an interview in which Eddie Murphy said that he would work with John Landis again as soon as Vic Morrow works with John Landis again. If you know, you know, that is a dark joke and a truly sick burn You can follow this link to understand the context of that cutting insult. 

Beverly Hills Cop 3 is the subject of the newest edition of the I Hate Critics 1994 Podcast, a spinoff of the I Hate Critics Movie Review Podcast. Each week, I subject Gen-Z'er M.J and Gen X'er Amy, to a movie that was released in theaters 30 years ago that week. The goal is to examine how movies and popular culture have changed in just the last 30 years. You can listen to the I Hate Critics 1994 Podcast on the I Hate Critics Movie Review Podcast feed wherever you listen to podcasts. If you're wondering whether Amy, M.J, and I are aware of Beverly Hills Cop 4 coming to Netflix this summer? Yes, and we are significantly unexcited about it. 

Find my archive of more than 20 years and more than 2000 movie reviews at SeanattheMovies.blogspot.com. Find my modern review archive on my Vocal Profile, linked here. Follow me on Twitter at PodcastSean. Follow the archive blog on Twitter at SeanattheMovies. Listen to me talk about movies on the I Hate Critics Movie Review Podcast. If you have enjoyed what you have read, consider subscribing to my writing on Vocal. If you'd like to support my writing, you can do so by making a monthly pledge or by leaving a one time tip. Thanks! 

Classic Movie Review Amazon Women on the Moon

Amazon Women on the Moon (1987) 

Directed by Joe Dante, Carl Gottlieb, Peter Horton, John Landis, Robert K. Weiss 

Written by Michael Barrie, Jim Mulholland 

Starring Arsenio Hall, Michelle Pfeiffer, Joe Pantoliano, David Allan Grier, Rosanna Arquette 

Release Date September 18th, 1987 

Published September 18tth, 2017 

One of the first movies I ever reviewed on my podcast, when it was still called I Hate Critics, now Everyone’s a Critic, was a disconcerting sketch comedy movie called Movie 43. The film was a series of appalling short films strung together with no narrative under a title that one could imagine it having been randomly assigned by a movie studio for storage purposes, not intended for theatrical release. That this series of short films starred such actors as Hugh Jackman, Kate Winslet, Richard Gere, Liev Schreiber, and Naomi Watts are the only reason Movie 43 ever saw the light of day.

When I saw Movie 43 I had never even heard of the obscure 1987 comedy Amazon Women on the Moon. I take that back, I did hear of it but I assumed it was some sort of softcore pornographic comedy. I think I may have also confused it with the movie Cannibal Women in the Amazon Jungle of Death, an epically unfunny spoof movie starring Bill Maher, before Politically Incorrect, oddly enough, and Shannon Tweed.

It turns out, Amazon Women on the Moon is everything that Movie 43 wished it could have been, trenchant, hilarious, weird, and just plain fun. Twenty-six years before Movie 43 strung together a random assemblage of movie stars in unfunny short films, writers and directors John Landis, Carl Gottlieb, Robert K. Weiss, and Carl Dante, all born from the Roger Corman school of filmmaking, pulled off the trick Movie 43 so desperately failed at, a ragingly funny sketch comedy movie.

Amazon Women on the Moon consists of 19 short films, some related, some not. The sketches do vary in quality, with Joe Dante really stealing the show in his portions, while Robert K. Weiss struggles a little with the film’s title sketch. Landis and Gottlieb go a far less traditional route with mostly good results, especially Gottlieb’s use of nudity which is wonderfully absurd and genuinely inspired.

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media 

Classic Movie Review An American Werewolf in London

An American Werewolf in London (1991) 

Directed by John Landis 

Written by John Landis

Starring David Naughton, Griffin Dunne, Jenny Agutter

Release Date August 21st, 1981

Published February 27th, 2023 

I don't get it. Well, I understand what people see in American Werewolf in London, but I don't get why it has lasted in people's memories for over 40 years. American Werewolf in London has some terrific practical effects and makeup. It has several memorable visuals, mostly in the makeup effects by the iconic Rick Baker. That's a solid legacy but beyond that, there is not much of a movie here. Thin characters, a horror comedy tone that is never funny, and disconnected scenes that linger rather than move things along, left me rather bored by a movie with a reputation as a horror classic. 

American Werewolf in London stars blandly handsome commercial pitchman, David Naughton as David and Griffin Dunne as David's best friend Jack. Somehow, David convinced Jack to go backpacking across England, specifically in the cold and rainy Yorkshire Moors, even as Jack greatly preferred going to the warmer and more welcoming environment in Greece or Italy. The two are miserable and cold and when they find a pub in a small town, things don't get any better. 

The locals are rude and stand-offish, they send the American visitors away without so much as a warm beverage. The only thing the locals tell the two young men is to stay out of the Moors. Naturally, they don't listen and up walking in the bright light of a full moon across the empty Moors. In the distance, they hear what sounds like a dog or a wolf. Indeed, it's a werewolf, one the locals were fully aware of but failed to keep the young men from encountering. 

Subsequently, Jack is brutally mutilated while David runs away like a coward. He does turn back for Jack but only so that we in the audience can be shown Jack's brutally desiccated corpse. David himself is then attacked but survives when several of the guilt-ridden pub patrons come to rescue him and kill the werewolf. Unfortunately for both David and Jack, David has been bitten before he was rescued and the Werewolf curse was transferred to him. 

The curse also effects poor Jack who cannot rest in peace until the Werewolf bloodline is ended. That means that David needs to die or Jack will live on as a member of the living dead. In the best part of the movie, Rick Baker's makeup turns Griffin Dunne into an ever rotting corpse whose decay is more and more present the more we see him. Dunne, unfortunately for the rest of the movie, is far more charming and engaging than star David Naughton and the movie suffers when Dunne isn't on screen. 

Put it simply, David Naughton is completely overmatched when challenged with carrying the movie. He's blandly handsome but there is nothing much more too him. So much of the movie is spent in his company and because of that, the movie never gains any charm or momentum. Naughton is a giant void at the center of the movie, sucking in all that might be interesting about writer-director John Landis' homage to classic MGM monster movies. 

Find my full length review at Horror.Media