The Naked Gun Movie Review — Sucharita Tyagi

If you haven’t seen the original Naked Gun movie series, I highly recommend you do.

Not because this new one requires a whole lot of background knowledge, though some WOULD be handy, but mainly because you HAVE to see lead character Frank Drebin introduction.

And if you REALLY don’t want to watch the old one, let me paint you a picture, aa jaao.

Frank Drebin, originally played by the late actor Leslie Nielsen, is a member of the ‘Police Squad’. The year is 1988, Drebin infiltrates a meeting of world leaders, around the table are look-alikes of Idi Amin, Ayatollah Khomeini, Gaddafi, Yasser Arafat, Mikhail Gorbachev, Fidel Castro. As Drebin beats them up one by one, he ends the scene with a warning- keep your nefarious world domination plans away from America.

This scene doesn’t have anything to do with the plot, which also involves ridiculing the Queen Of England btw, but watching it now, one can very well appreciate the satire on “America is number 1” style law enforcement movies Hollywood has spent years and millions perfecting and disseminating.

Cut to 2025. Leslie Nielson is gone, replaced by Liam Neeson, who plays his son, doing the same job. And the apple hasn’t fallen far from the tree.

Locking in to the Hollywood action movie stereotype, the film opens during a bank heist in the most filmy looking bank with a very Hollywood looking villain, white hair, slick suit. As he steals an instrument literally labelled “Plot Device’, Frank Drebin shows up disguised as a little girl, once again beating up the bad guys. The opening credits roll, like it’s a Marvel movie, and Akiva Schaffer, who you might recognise as one third of the Andy Samberg comedy/music group Lonely Island, has you hooked in under 5 minutes.

I did enter the film with trepidation- this is not the 80s, a cop comedy with a goofball but still somewhat competent protagonist, is bound to have the intended side-effect of absolution (incidentally, the title of an action film starring Liam Neeson). But for a cold cynical heart, the ridiculous speed at which jokes come at you, guards and defences quickly drop. How can you not laugh at a major action movie star who has now worked long enough to willingly participate in a parody of his entire career, almost crap his pants in a police car because he has eaten too many hot dogs?

Naked Gun not very quietly acknowledges the impunity law enforcement enjoys and leaves absolutely no stone unturned to remind you that the only way this police officer might even come close to doing a competent job is if everyone looked the other way and a literal flying owl carries him over the heads of his enemies. Micheal Scott, Homer Simpson, Closeau, Starlord and that dog that says it’s all okay while the world burns around it, all rolled into one, Drebin is also effectively used to mock the masculinity popular culture loves to celebrate. Which also makes this casting so genius.

Speaking of cast, Pamela Anderson is magnificent as Beth Davenport, an author looking for help to solve the murder of her brother. The actor’s presence is magnetic, seriously, when Pamela Anderson is in the frame, the most incredible fireworks could be going off in the background, and you wouldn’t notice. Admittedly, there isn’t much for her to do except show up as a beautiful and hilarious distraction over and over, but aren’t you glad enough feminist critique of enough films has brought popular culture to this point where the female actor opposite a 73 year old male actor is……oh no wait, she is still 15 years younger than him.

By the end, the laughs did become laborious and forced as Naked Gun loses a lot of steam approach an appropriately ridiculous climax. It just makes sense that the villain is a tech billionaire threatning to turn all human beings into murderous zombies using rays emitted from all their personal devices.

In a film this kind of bad guy can be defeated, IRL we are way past the point of no return. Enjoy the chaos while it’s still funny. The film is in theatres now.

So, on a scale of 1 to 10, Naked Gun is….3 surprise guest appearances I toh noticed. You tell me if you spot more, bataao comments mein!