As a feature film retread of a vapid ’80s cop show re-imagined as an R-rated slapstick action-comedy starring that one kid from Superbad and that dude from G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra, 21 Jump Street should logically suck. It somehow works, and works well. Directors Phil Lord and Christopher Miller (Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs) succeed in mining familiar terrain for some good laughs, thanks mostly to the unlikely comedic duo of Jonah Hill and Channing Tatum.
The prologue, set in 2005, introduces Schmidt (Hill), a chubby geek tragically imitating the fashion sense of Eminem, and Jenko (Tatum), a clueless and underachieving jock. These two are destined for anything but greatness.
Flashforward to the present, where the two help each other (barely) graduate from police academy, and wind up on bicycle patrol in the city park. After botching their first arrest, they are reassigned to the Jump Street unit run by the intimidating, no-nonsense Captain Dickson (a hilariously profane Ice Cube). The two are sent undercover as high school students — posing and siblings, no less — in order to break up a drug ring run by James Franco’s younger brother. (No, really.) Times have changed, however, and so have teens. Geek is the new, diversity is the norm, and Schmidt is now the popular kid while Jenko is the one toiling away in band and AP science.
Hill and Tatum are what make Jump Street work. They make great mismatched partners, like Will Farrell and Mark Wahlberg in the similar The Other Guys. Tatum, often a wooden screen presence, holds back nothing in his first comedic role, and often steals the spotlight from his co-staras he tears loose.
TV show-based movies, buddy cop cliches, and action-movie tropes are all poked fun at, but Lord and Miller aim for more than lazy parody. The series is known for launching the career of Johnny Depp, and little else. (Ah, the unrealized potential of Richard Grieco — one can only imagine what might have been.) There’s no die-hard fan following with rigid expectations, which gives the directors plenty of room to manuever, and they make the movie their own, finding plenty of absurdist humor in the simple premise of two outsiders living out the fantasy of doing high school over again, on their own terms.
At the same time, they poke fun at the source material and shoot holes in Hollywood’s addiction to rehashing old ideas. The comedy is so effective that ironically it’s only during the mundane action sequences that the movie drags.
It’s a startling moment when Jeff Who Lives at Home opens with actor Jason Segel dictating to a tape recorder the meaning of M. Night Shyamalan’s Signs — not so much because it’s a tight close-up, but because we’re not used to seeing such sad desperation and confusion on the face of the perpetually and endearingly goofy Segel. It sets the tone perfectly for the story that plays out behind it, a charming, whimsical, and (thankfully) non-twee comedy from mumblecore filmmaker brothers Jay and Mark Duplass (The Puffy Chair).
Segel plays Jeff, an unmarried, unemployed, and unkempt 30-year-old who spends his days in his mother’s basement getting stoned and looking for a cosmic sign to point out his destiny. His widowed mother (Susan Sarandon) arguably does the same from within the cubicle of her mundane office job, while his self-centered brother Pat (Ed Helms) is busy finishing off his wilting marriage to wife Linda (Judy Greer).
Jeff believes the universe is full of meaningful coincidences, and that if one is open to them he or she will experience that perfect moment of clarity. It’s not giving away too much to reveal that’s exactly what happens over the course of a single day in the life of Jeff and his family. The hows and whys are the treat.
Jeff isn’t a hard story to tell, but it is a hard one to tell properly. The brothers Duplass are savvy enough to hold back the sentimentality and cloying sweetness that less confident filmmakers often rely upon. Aside from some awkward camera zooms, they rely on understatement and a deadpan, naturalistic style, and are content to stand back and let the cast room to maneuver.
That ridiculously talented cast rises to the occasion, too, with Segel and Helms especially displaying strong chemistry together as they play out the complex bonds of and intense devotion and equally intense antagonism that often exist between brothers.
