Cinema Review: 21 Jump Street Colin D Miller March 14, 2012 Movie Reviews 1781 Not many TV shows make the successful transition to the big screen. Usually the results are so dismal, they end up tarnishing the pleasant memories viewers used to have. There’s The Avengers, Charlie’s Angels, The X-Files – all duds in my humble opinion and it terrifies me that people will often demand the likes of a Friends movie (please, god, no!). Thankfully, I’m too young to remember 21 Jump Street and as a result that has probably led me to the conclusion that 21 Jump Street is a pleasant viewing experience. Featuring Jonah Hill and a surprisingly amusing Channing Tatum, 21 Jump Street tells the story of two incompetent police officers that are signed up to an undercover police operation that sees them infiltrating a high school drug gang. Armed with some new identities, Schmidt (Hill) and Jenko (Tatum) find that school has changed since their Slim Shady days and a lot of the things they used to think are cool are no longer socially acceptable. It also doesn’t help matters when at the first hurdle Schmidt and Jenko get their prepared identities mixed up and spend the rest of the film out of their depth. For me the most impressive thing about 21 Jump Street was the pacing. While the plot was not the strongest feature, the jokes came fast enough that not once did I find myself bored with it. Speaking of the humour, the scriptwriter Michael Bacall, clearly had a lot of fun in the process of the production and pays homage to the original series on several occasions, whilst taking a number of opportunities to poke fun at itself. Both the main actors are on top form here, even if Jonah HIll is playing a role that is suspiciously like his breakout character Seth from Superbad. The precision of their comic timing pays off remarkably well and it’s quite possible that Schmidt and Jenko are the best buddy cop duo since Hott Fuzz’s Danny Butterman and Nick Angel. Also featuring good turns from Dave Franco, Brie Larson and Ice Cube, 21 Jump Street is solid enough action comedy. While it is not exactly original, it certainly makes no secret of that fact. And with its well paced comedy, it’s broad range of humour and some well placed surprises, it is certainly worth checking out. Verdict: [rating=3]
