In theatres: The Other Guys (2010)

The way Hollywood sees it, there are two kinds of police officers. There are the "glamour" types, the ones who solve the biggest cases and get the most attention from the media. And, then, there are the "Other Guys", the white collar officers who file the reports if/when their "superstar" comrades choose not to.

In this case, the "Other Guys" are detectives Alan Gamble (Will Ferrell, "Land of the Lost") and Terry Hoitz (Mark Wahlberg, "Planet of the Apes"). Hoitz was demoted to desk duty after making a critical error in judgment and knee-capped Yankees star Derek Jeter (who appears in a cameo flashback). Gamble was promoted from-----wait for it----forensic accounting. What? CSI has beancounters? What? Their boss, Capt. Mock (Michael Keaton), works a second job to pay his son's tuition. Both Gamble & Hoitz are waiting for the chance to prove they can be first-string sleuths themselves, and a case just happens to fall right into their laps when Gamble discovers that an investment banker (Steve Coogan) has had buildings developed but no contracts for scaffolding. That problem's solved rather quickly, but it turns out the guy is a regular Bernie Madoff, and has created a Ponzi scheme to steal the NYPD's pension fund. Here's the trailer, courtesy of Funnyordie and YouTube. Funnyordie, by the way, is a website run, if I remember right, by Ferrell and director Adam McKay.

Here's the trailer:



Savor the presence of Samuel L. Jackson ("Iron Man 2") and Dwayne Johnson, whom we'll see next in "Faster", as they only appear during the first half-hour of the movie. Ray Stevenson ("Punisher War Zone") provides appropriate menace as a security agent who's looking to make sure the scheme goes through.

One running gag involves Gamble being a bit of a chick magnet, much to Hoitz's consternation. Gamble is married to a hottie (Eva Mendes), while Hoitz is trying to reconnect with an ex (Lindsay Sloane), but embarrasses them both when he crashes her dance class. What helps move the story along is the narration of an uncredited Ice-T (Law & Order: Special Victims Unit). I kept expecting Ice to show up somewhere along the way, but no go.

It seemed appropriate, too that one of the trailers was for "Green Hornet", due in January, because Hoitz does his best impersonation of Kato in a pair of fight scenes that were some of the best parts of the film. As Gamble, Ferrell is unusually restrained for much of the film, save for the "Bad Cop/Bad Cop" sequence with Coogan. Wahlberg flashed back to his Marky Mark days by doing a few moves during a sequence in which Hoitz is busted down to traffic cop. 20 years later, he's still got it.

Rating: A.