Police Academy opened in 1984 as a comedy sent to the police academy for a reason the story never quite explains. It wants to be a satire, a lampoon of the academy, and it settles instead on a collection of jokes about a man, a woman, a giant and a beatboxer.
A new rule opens the academy to anyone who shows up, and the instructors are not happy about it. Carey Mahoney, played by Steve Guttenberg, takes the place as a sentence instead of going to jail. He has little interest in being a police cadet until he meets Karen Thompson, played by Kim Cattrall. Lieutenant Harris, played by G.W. Bailey, sees him as trouble and wants him out.
This is a film about being a police cadet, and it never steps outside that narrow space.
Trailer, via ClipZone: Comedy Callbacks.
The Squad
The cast is a collection of types, each one set to deliver a single kind of joke throughout the film:
- Moses Hightower, played by Bubba Smith, is the gentle giant.
- Larvell Jones, played by Michael Winslow, is the human beatboxer.
- Tackleberry, played by David Graf, is the gun fanatic.
- George Martin, played by Andrew Rubin, is the lothario.
- Douglas Fackler, played by Bruce Mahler, is the accident-prone one.
- Leslie Barbara, played by Donovan Scott, is the bullied one.
The script never gives any of them a reason to be there beyond their type, and that is a problem. It is also the source of most of what works in short stretches.
The Jokes
The film is at its best when it lets the characters play against each other without trying to explain why they are doing it. A party turns into a dance at the Blue Oyster Bar with gay biker patrons. A prostitute arrives in Barbara’s room. Mahoney and Hightower steal a car. None of it lands as satire so much as it lands as a steady stream of broad comedy aimed at a young audience.
The film does not trust its audience to follow a character arc. It trusts a gag to last a minute or two, and when it does, that minute or two is often enough.
Where It Falls Short
The film never rises above its own typecast. It repeats the same jokes about the same characters for nearly two hours, and the satire of the academy never arrives because the film never bothers to do the work of satire. It is a film about a police academy full of oddballs, and it never says why that matters.
Winslow’s beatbox routine is the film’s most memorable stretch, and it carries moments that still play. But the film’s reach exceeds its grasp. It wants to be a satire of the police academy, a comedy of characters lost in a place they did not choose, and it never quite delivers on any of it. It is content to be a film about a man, a woman, a giant and a beatboxer, and that is a smaller ambition than the title suggests.
Police Academy is a comedy of moments, not a comedy of ideas. It works in short stretches and fails to hold together as a whole. It is worth a look for the beatboxer and the giant, but not worth the time it takes to sit through it a second time.
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