Delightful it may be to see Liam Neeson take the reins of The Naked Gun, the problems the film faces are piled too high. A veteran action star who delights in not taking himself too seriously is a rarity, though the likability of Neeson and co-stars Pamela Anderson and Paul Walter Hauser are not enough to lift the lighter-than-light moments found in this continuation of the Frank Drebin family. There’s no point comparing the Leslie Nielsen-starring trilogy and television programme to this Akiva Schaffer-directed fourth instalment, they are different beasts entirely. The Naked Gun was a rip-roaring, laugh-a-minute spectacle where the subtleties of the sharp writing were hidden away by the sight gags and screamingly great fun. The Neeson-starring film never shows it has the capabilities to do the same, and where parody is often cheap, it does not have to be predictably tame and ultimately charmless.
That’s the sad reality for the Neeson-led return to Police Squad. Neeson gives everything he has to Drebin Jr, but the writing lets him down. A breakneck pace and yet little detail in the background, even less in the foreground. It’s written with the same intent as Epic Movie or Disaster Movie. Make a mockery of popular genre tropes while failing to offer an appropriate or independent alternative. It’s no fun to poke holes in what we know is cliché. Finding new routes through is what matters. A parody film which falls to its own parodies is a complete disaster. From a pantsless Neeson parading around an octagon to a Clippy cameo in a Tesla knock-off. Part of the charm should be from the cheap look at all the modern tech, mocked into oblivion, but those moments of brilliance are few and far between. The Naked Gun has the occasionally brilliant sight gag but the longer running jokes, Drebin Jr’s fondness for snapping phones after he finishes a call, are not scattered across the film but thrown into one section.
The Naked Gun forgets some of the basics of comedy in its desire to recapture the magic of the original. Considering how easy it would be to use the first three films as a crutch, Schaffer and the crew do a respectable job of trying to stand the Neeson instalment on its own merits. Anderson and Neeson have great chemistry; part of that comes from a full dedication to the script and all its comical nurturing. But when the writing is subpar, the problems are inevitable. A rip of the plot from Kingsman: The Secret Service isn’t the problem; it’s the lack of charm in adapting it. A heavy-handedness, from the ponzi-scheme arena to the P.L.O.T. Device, only works when the gags related to it are strong. But there are few, if any, knocking around. Those jokes that are embedded for the sake of the plot hardly work, either.
Agonizingly unfunny at the best of times, but then it’s hard to write off this Neeson-led film. Very predictable jokes which are leafing through the Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery handbook, but are also banking on the familiarity being part of the punchline. The latter fails to connect, and often viewers are left with a rip of an old joke, with no context to freshen it or point out its original failings. A lazy spoof film with few gags worth remembering. But Neeson, Anderson, and Hauser are so passionately committed. It could be much worse; it could have been Ed Helms in the lead role, as was the plan a decade ago. Seth MacFarlane produces the film out of development hell, but when it gets on screen, it becomes clear he only pulled it so far as parody-filled purgatory.
