Detroit detective Axel Foley returns to Beverly Hills once again, this time to help his lawyer daughter after his old friend Billy Rosewood tips off that her client is at the center of a conspiracy involving dangerous individuals.
Proposing a sequel several years after the previous chapter is a question of risks and rewards. In the case of Beverly Hills Copthe third was such a failure – even according to Eddie Murphy – that producing a fourth film could only restore the franchise’s reputation. Then relaunch it – a fifth installment is in development.
Thirty years have passed between the two films. Fortunately, at 63, Eddie Murphy still seems in great shape. And since his Axel Foley fights crime with his jaw muscles more than anyone else, age is less of a factor. The artisans ofAxel F. have resisted the temptation to follow the trend of action-packed cop movies. A few well-orchestrated chases—three of them in hilarious little vehicles—and just-explosive-enough shootouts are enough to punctuate a story that prefers to put its characters in the spotlight.
From the first scene, we understand that Axel has not calmed down. He is still the rarely serious, verbal detective who prefers to act rather than think. He still lives only for his work, to the point of having moved his family to Beverly Hills to protect them. His daughter (Taylour Paige), a lawyer in her thirties, cut ties with him long ago. But when Billy Rosewood (Judge Reinhold), now a private investigator, calls his old friend to tell him that Jane – Saunders, she has renounced the Foley name – is in danger, Axel takes the first plane to Los Angeles.
As in the first film, the likeable but stubborn police officer will conduct his own investigation and will be quickly arrested. At the station, he will reconnect with his best enemy John Taggart (John Ashton), now chief of police, and will meet Bobby Abbott (Joseph Gordon-Levitt). From the new generation, the young detective will teach him with more or less success that certain ways of doing things are no longer acceptable.
Above all, Axel will try to repair his relationship with Jane. This is probably the greatest achievement of Mark Molloy’s first feature film. The father-daughter conversations are carefully written, the reactions realistic, the emotions just right. Eddie Murphy and Taylour Page deliver performances of impressive sincerity for a film of this genre.
Besides, the plot is well-crafted, the nostalgia is well-measured and the songs, retro and recent, sunny like LA. Don’t worry, the composer Lorne Balfe beautifully covers the mythical notes ofAlex F by Harold Faltermeyer.
On Netflix
Police comedy
Beverly Hills Cop – Axel F.
(VF: Beverly Hills Cop – Axel F.)
Mark Molloy
With Eddie Murphy, Taylour Page, Joseph Gordon-Levitt
1:58