Few fools have ever cashed quite like Kevin Hart. This guy wasn’t as big a Craig Robinson in 2013. That six or seven major releases ago. And it doesn’t even include his stand up “documentaries.” Those things are like printing money, huh? Kevin says, “hey, I wrote some more jokes” and producers salivate. I bet they could have him in front of a sell-out crowd that night if need be. Just point a camera or two and *poof* millions of box office dollars.
Kevin’s starring roles haven’t (generally) been in good films, or even fair ones. Like Ride Along and Ride Along 2, they tend to be vehicles (pun intended) for Kevin to display his modern Lou Costello brand of frail insecurity and egregious overacting. Coming along for the Rides, Ice Cube gets to be Bud Abbott. I can’t think of a weirder, yet apt, comparison — James Payton (Cube) exists to make Kevin Hart seem funnier than he is. Sometimes it works. Often it does not.
So Benjamin Bratt, and not Lou Diamond Phillips as I had first guessed, is a beeeeg bad guy in Miami. Meanwhile, Ice Cube and Kevin Hart are Atlanta cops. Do I even have to use their character names? What sense does that make? It’s Ice Cube. It’s Kevin Hart. There ya go. Hart is one month into being a beat cop, but that doesn’t stop him from breaking all kinds of protocol and screwing up undercover busts. There’s a point at which this stopped being funny and started being – “but you’re actually hurting more than helping …” That
point was reached long before this film. Long story short –Cube and Hart go to Miami Beach for comedy ‘n’ policin’. Come for the detection, stay for Ken Jeong.
There were some genuine laugh-out-loud moments in Ride Along 2 – Yeah, the old “need to change drivers during a chase” saw is tired, but the understanding that Kevin (a.k.a. “Black Hammer”) is really into Grand Theft Auto put a unique spin to his Furious attack on the Miami Beach strip. Generally, the Rides Along are very much Abbott & Costello stuff – Hart does something stupid, Cube either pretends he’s above it or berates him for it – it was probably a good idea to make Kevin marry Cube’s sister, because otherwise why would Cube have anything to do with Hart?
If you’re sold out of The Revenant, Ride Along 2 will not satisfy your need to be professionally entertained. However, if you’re excited by the preview to Barbershop: The Next Cut, you’re in the right theater.
♪Hart and Cube
I’m stuck watching you on the tube
Because nothing was right
With stolen cable that night
Hart and Cube
Just begged to be adored
Got a laugh and acted overboard madly
In a movie ‘bout crime
Thank God I have time
Oh but the premise was thrilling, well … or middling
Often before I’ve seen such half-assed diddling
But now with TBS I’m through
Two hours gone I’m a boob
Thanks to you both, Hart and Cube♫
Rated PG-13, 101 Minutes
D: Tim Story
W: Phil Hay & Matt Manfredi
Genre: The continuing misadventures of Kevin Hart
Type of person most likely to enjoy this film: Fans of the first, I imagine. This one is no different.
Type of person least likely to enjoy this film: Where is your personal tolerance for Kevin Hart?
♪ Parody inspired by “Heart and Soul”
