Jake Johnson and Damon Wayans Jr. star as Ryan and Justin, two friends who dress as police officers for a college reunion and accidentally become local heroes. That premise sounds like a setup for a sharp comedy. Instead, “Let’s Be Cops” spends its runtime chasing a crime thriller that its leads can barely handle, and the result is a film that never finds its footing.
Trailer, via Moviefone.
Ryan and Justin’s Pact
Ryan is an unemployed former college quarterback, and Justin is a struggling video game designer. They recall a pact they made in college: if they had not achieved success by age thirty, they would move back to Columbus, Ohio. After Ryan gets hit by an intimidating Albanian gang outside a bar, he convinces Justin to wear the police uniforms from his failed pitch for a police-themed video game as costumes at their reunion.
The uniforms earn them much respect and attention. Ryan enjoys the charade and decides to keep it going, while Justin grows uncomfortable. Ryan learns official procedures from YouTube and modifies a decommissioned Ford Crown Victoria Police Interceptor to resemble an active Los Angeles Police Department vehicle. Justin reluctantly joins him, and begins a relationship with Josie, a waitress he likes.
The Gang’s Leader
Their antics draw the attention of Mossi Kasic, the Albanian gang’s leader. Mossi intimidates the “officers” into doing nothing when Josie calls about a man harassing her at the restaurant. The friends obtain surveillance equipment from Patrol Officer Segars to stakeout Mossi, observing him with an unidentified partner who has been investigating Ryan and Justin, believing them to be federal agents.
Josie, an aspiring makeup artist, helps disguise Justin as Pupa to infiltrate Mossi’s club. The plan goes wrong, and the friends find themselves entangled in a real web of mobsters and dirty detectives. They must put their fake badges on the line to survive.
A Comedy That Runs On Empty
The problem is that “Let’s Be Cops” is not really a comedy. It is a crime movie with two guys in uniforms who cannot act like real officers. The jokes land in the first ten minutes, then the film shifts to a series of chase scenes, shootouts and confrontations that feel like a parody of a Michael Bay film rather than a comedy about two men pretending to be police.
Rob Riggle plays Officer Segars, a patrol officer who provides some of the film’s few genuinely funny moments. Nina Dobrev plays Josie, and James D’Arcy plays Mossi Kasic. Andy Garcia plays Brolin, a detective who investigates Ryan and Justin. Jon Lajoie plays Todd Cutter, and Tom Mardirosian plays Georgie. Rebecca Koon plays Lydia, and Joshua Ormond plays Little Joey.
None of it works.
“Fake Cops. Real Trouble.”
That tagline promises a satire of police culture. What the film delivers is a plot that keeps escalating until it breaks entirely. The stakes grow so high that the central joke — two friends dressing up — stops mattering. Ryan and Justin are supposed to be relatable losers, but the film treats them as action heroes, and that mismatch is fatal.
Where It Went Wrong
The film’s biggest mistake is its refusal to commit to tone. It starts as a comedy about two friends who get ahead by wearing uniforms, then turns into a crime thriller with explosions, chases and gunfights. The two genres do not mix, and the film spends its final act trying to balance both, succeeding at neither.
The action sequences are poorly staged, with cars crashing and people running through empty streets without any sense of danger. The script expects the audience to believe that two men who know nothing about police work can survive a confrontation with a gang leader, and it never explains why anyone would listen to them.
The film also fails to establish a real bond between Ryan and Justin. Their friendship is mentioned in passing, but the film spends more time on the chase scenes than on the reasons these two men would risk everything to protect each other. Without that foundation, the ending feels hollow, a resolution that comes too late to salvage a film that lost its way halfway through.
The Numbers
- Title: Let’s Be Cops
- Year: 2014
- Director: Luke Greenfield
- Writer: Luke Greenfield, Nicholas Thomas
- Stars: Jake Johnson, Damon Wayans Jr., Rob Riggle, Nina Dobrev
- Runtime: 104 minutes
- Genre: Comedy
- Tagline: “Fake Cops. Real Trouble.”
- Budget: $17 million
- Worldwide Gross: $138.2 million
- Score: 3.0/10
“Let’s Be Cops” is a film that knows what it wants to be but cannot hold onto it. It is a comedy that becomes a thriller, a thriller that becomes a disaster, and a disaster that never earns the trouble it promises. The cast is game, the premise is clever, and the execution is a mess.
The film is available to stream on various platforms. If you want to watch it, be prepared for a movie that spends its entire runtime chasing a joke it never lands.
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