Josh Reviews 22 Jump Street
I enjoyed 21 Jump Street but not nearly as much as many others seemed to. I remember reading rave reviews of the film, and I saw it on several best-of-the-year lists. I’m not sure what others saw in the film that I didn’t. I thought it was an amusing diversion but not much more than that. (Click here for my original review.) Still, I was interested when I heard that Jonah Hill and Channing Tatum were reuniting for a sequel. Their chemistry was the best part of the first film, and I was curious to see where they’d take things in a second installment.
I wasn’t blown away by 22 Jump Street, though I certainly had a good time watching it. This is not a very clever comedy but it’s funny and good-natured enough that it’s hard to find too much fault with it for being the dumb comedy it clearly is setting out to be.
The film takes a smart approach to being a comedy sequel in that it goes out of its way to repeatedly poke fun at the very idea of a comedy sequel. I like this self-referential, tongue in cheek attitude, and it gives the film an endearing sense of playfulness. Even though they make this same joke way too many times.
In fact, the film has two main jokes, each of which it pounds into the ground through repetition followed by more repetition. Those two jokes are 1) the idea that they’re making fun of being a sequel in which everyone just wants the exact same story of the first film told again, and 2) the idea that the arc of Schmidt (Jonah Hill) and Jenko (Channing Tatum)’s relationship, their “bromance,” is just like the arc of a love affair between a man and a woman. Both ideas are funny and good fodder for humor. But both also grow tiresome when the movie makes the hundredth joke about each of them. We get it guys!!! We get it!!
Nick Offerman and Ice Cube return from the first film and both have a lot of fun with their scenes, especially Ice Cube who is a hoot. There are a few new actors of note in this installment, particularly Amber Stevens as Maya, Schmidt’s new love-interest. I wish she had more of an actual character to play. Jillian Bell kills it as Maya’s roommate from hell. She has one scene in particular with Jonah Hill, in which the two can’t seem to decide if they want to beat the shit out of one another or to make out, that is on its own a reason to go see this movie.
The funniest part of the film is the closing credits. The closing credits are pure genius. I wish the rest of the film operated at anything close to that level.
Overall I can’t say there was anything particularly notable or memorable about this film. 22 Jump Street is an amusung diversion. I laughed and had a good time watching it, but this isn’t a film I plan to revisit anytime soon.