In high school, Schmidt and Jenko (Jonah Hill and Channing Tatum, respectively) played the roles one might expect. Jenko was the loud-mouthed jock, Schmidt the outcast dressed, as Jenko puts it, “not so Slim Shady.” When the two meet again at police academy years later, they realize it’s time to put their differences aside and work together to earn their badges. One epic montage later and they’re on the force. However, a botched drug arrest gets them sent to the 21 Jump Street office, headquarters for the district’s undercover high school operations, to root out a new drug that’s surfaced before it spreads to other districts.
Jump Street could easily have played out a very different way from this point on. In fact, the movie’s casting really would lead you to think that Tatum would play the alpha leader of their operation, with Hill playing yet another awkward sidekick. Thankfully, the movie turns this notion completely on its head. As soon as the pair returns to high school, it’s clear that things have changed. There are new cliques (neither Schmidt nor Jenko is able to identify with the group of kids standing around in thick black-rimmed glasses), and Jenko soon finds out that it’s no longer cool to punch somebody in the parking lot on the first day of school. So while Jenko is relegated to hanging out with the chemistry nerds, Schmidt quickly finds friends and gains a lead on finding the drug supplier.
Who would’ve thought Tatum could pull off being the foil in a comedy duo? Though Hill may have proven his acting chops lately, even grabbing an Oscar nomination for his role in Moneyball, it’s outstanding that Tatum is able to be the “funny guy” in a movie where his opposite is one of the major players in today’s comedy.
Though Jump Street is a comedy through and through, the buddy-cop angle requires at least some car chases and gunplay. To my pleasant surprise, the action in the movie was crisp and stylish. However, even these scenes rarely take themselves too seriously. While a character taking a bullet looks hyper-realistic, Jump Street has no problem pumping other characters with dozens of bullets just for the absurdity of it.
I won’t bother recounting the jokes in Jump Street, but suffice it to say that they’re consistent and, more importantly, consistently funny. The jokes provide a great blend of slapstick, pop culture references and plenty of the “random” jokes of which more recent comedies are so fond.
Though high production value and a great script do carry the film far, it’s the casting that makes it remarkable. Even aside from Tatum and Hill, the supporting cast is remarkably solid. Rob Riggle plays a perfect track and field coach, Brie Larson evokes the high school comedies of the ’80s and more minor appearances from Ice Cube, Parks and Recreation’s Nick Offerman and YouTube star Dax Flame help to elevate Jump Street beyond typical comedy fare.
Though I’ve never seen the source material, a bit of Googling suggests that the original 21 Jump Street T.V. show was a far cry from comedy, instead serving as more of a PSA about controversial topics of the time. So why remake the show into a comedy film some twenty years later? Honestly, it seems to be for the clever premise. 21 Jump Street openly mocks the film industry’s recycling of old properties for a quick buck; save for the basic structure the movie feels completely fresh. In terms of substance, perhaps the only major carryover from the 1980s is the film’s sincerity; the performances by Brie Larson and others really do call to mind the emotional character of a John Hughes movie. Lately, it seems a comedy that packs both laughs and substance is few and far between. Thankfully, 21 Jump Street boasts plenty of both.
