So many things to complain about, and with only a thousand words...
When Police Academy was first released, the audience was issued with 2D glasses so they could see the characters in all their glory. This group of cardboard cut-out non-entities are perhaps the main flaw in a deeply flawed movie. Imagine how this puerile rubbish was pitched: People what shouldn't be in the police actually do be in the police. There's one man who does be cocky, another man what does make noises, a fat man whose belly is big, a woman what does speak quietly, a big man what is tall, a man who is clumsy and does wear glasses, a man who sleeps with lots of female women, a woman what is manly, and a man what is nasty. It would be generous to call these people one-note characters; they could barely make up a note between them. This bunch of stereotypes provide jokes and plot twists that can be guessed from the moment they first appear on screen; the only surprise in the movie comes in learning that it wasn't written by a twelve-year-old.
Steve Guttenberg's Mahoney is supposed to be cocky and charming, but is instead just a charmless, smarmy nothing. His character arc is sophisticated; he moves from being a cocky, anti-authority figure, to being a cocky, anti-authority figure in a police uniform. And he's not the only one to undergo such development. The woman who speaks quietly learns to shout; the fat guy who can't do self-defence beats up some innocent people; the slut settles down; the butch woman learns to love; the clumsy weed does something slightly unclumsy; the guy who makes noises learns to carry on making noises; the guy who loves guns continues to love guns; and the big tall guy stays at about the same height. Okay, so those last few weren't allowed to explore the depths of their characters quite so completely. A true loss to the world of cinema.
With characters as feeble as these, the movie can at least be saved by some great jokes. Which makes it more of a shame that there aren't any.
The most off-putting thing about this feeble, laugh-free movie is its attitude towards homosexuality. Whenever this subject comes up, the innocent tone is lost completely. When a dog tries to mate with a man's leg he is called a `queer'; when some cadets are sent to a gay bar they find themselves forced to dance and smooch with a threatening bunch of men cloned from half of Village People; the Commandant, who had thought Mahoney was gay because of a particularly puerile gag earlier in the movie, sees him kissing a woman and says `now that's more like it.' Remember, viewers: these people are to be feared, a moral that suggests this script was written in 1954 and took thirty years to get the green light. Another darker moment, as out of place as a decent joke, is when one cadet calls the quiet-speaking black woman `a chicaboo'. Hightower, the big black guy (he's big, geddit?) walks up to the racist cadet and the car he's sitting in, and turns the car onto its roof. He gets thrown out of the academy. That's Hightower, not the racist guy. These scenes reveal a darker and inappropriate side to the movie, which take it from unfunny pap to offensive plop.
Inexplicably making tons and tons of money, Police Academy was followed by six sequels, a TV adaptation, and a short-lived animated series. Together, they made more than three people laugh.
When Police Academy was first released, the audience was issued with 2D glasses so they could see the characters in all their glory. This group of cardboard cut-out non-entities are perhaps the main flaw in a deeply flawed movie. Imagine how this puerile rubbish was pitched: People what shouldn't be in the police actually do be in the police. There's one man who does be cocky, another man what does make noises, a fat man whose belly is big, a woman what does speak quietly, a big man what is tall, a man who is clumsy and does wear glasses, a man who sleeps with lots of female women, a woman what is manly, and a man what is nasty. It would be generous to call these people one-note characters; they could barely make up a note between them. This bunch of stereotypes provide jokes and plot twists that can be guessed from the moment they first appear on screen; the only surprise in the movie comes in learning that it wasn't written by a twelve-year-old.
Steve Guttenberg's Mahoney is supposed to be cocky and charming, but is instead just a charmless, smarmy nothing. His character arc is sophisticated; he moves from being a cocky, anti-authority figure, to being a cocky, anti-authority figure in a police uniform. And he's not the only one to undergo such development. The woman who speaks quietly learns to shout; the fat guy who can't do self-defence beats up some innocent people; the slut settles down; the butch woman learns to love; the clumsy weed does something slightly unclumsy; the guy who makes noises learns to carry on making noises; the guy who loves guns continues to love guns; and the big tall guy stays at about the same height. Okay, so those last few weren't allowed to explore the depths of their characters quite so completely. A true loss to the world of cinema.
With characters as feeble as these, the movie can at least be saved by some great jokes. Which makes it more of a shame that there aren't any.
The most off-putting thing about this feeble, laugh-free movie is its attitude towards homosexuality. Whenever this subject comes up, the innocent tone is lost completely. When a dog tries to mate with a man's leg he is called a `queer'; when some cadets are sent to a gay bar they find themselves forced to dance and smooch with a threatening bunch of men cloned from half of Village People; the Commandant, who had thought Mahoney was gay because of a particularly puerile gag earlier in the movie, sees him kissing a woman and says `now that's more like it.' Remember, viewers: these people are to be feared, a moral that suggests this script was written in 1954 and took thirty years to get the green light. Another darker moment, as out of place as a decent joke, is when one cadet calls the quiet-speaking black woman `a chicaboo'. Hightower, the big black guy (he's big, geddit?) walks up to the racist cadet and the car he's sitting in, and turns the car onto its roof. He gets thrown out of the academy. That's Hightower, not the racist guy. These scenes reveal a darker and inappropriate side to the movie, which take it from unfunny pap to offensive plop.
Inexplicably making tons and tons of money, Police Academy was followed by six sequels, a TV adaptation, and a short-lived animated series. Together, they made more than three people laugh.