The year was 1984. Synthesizers were all the rage in music. Big hair was in and Axel Foley (Eddie Murphy; 48 Hrs.) was the coolest cop around. He had all the jokes and, with the help of two Beverly Hills Cops named Billy Rosewood (Judge Reinhold; Fast Times at Ridgemont High) and John Taggart (John Ashton; Some Kind of Wonderful), solved all the crimes. Well...at least the ones that mattered to him. Forty years later Axel is still on the job and this time he has to solve the most personal crime yet. Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F premieres on Netflix on July 3, 2024.
Well-known defense attorney Jane Saunders (Taylour Paige; Ma Rainey's Black Bottom) walks into the jail and offers to take on a cop killer case Pro Bono, believing her clients innocent and the cop was on the take. As she leaves the jail, she is trapped in her car and threatened to forget the case. When Rosewood finds out what happened, he calls Axel who immediately flies to California, as Jane is his estranged daughter. When Rosewood disappears, Axel once again finds himself knee-deep in trouble in his favorite zip code - 90210.
Murphy is in full form in this fourth installment of the Beverly Hills Cop franchise. The jokes land in all the right places and the moment we see Rosewood and Taggart together again, they fall back into their same comedy routine, just like old times. Axel's old partner Jeffrey Friedman (Paul Reiser; Aliens) is now in charge but, as always, he has Axel's back. Besides Paige, also joining the cast are Joseph Gordon-Levitt (Looper) as Detective Bobby Abbott and Kevin Bacon (Footloose) as Captain Grant. Between the original cast members and the new additions, Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F has some great talent who work really well together and who help make the movie as good as it is.
Making his feature film debut, director Mark Molloy gives Axel F the same look and feel as its predecessors in keeping with the essence of the franchise. He frames some establishing shots of Beverly Hills well and offers a lot to look at while moving the story along. His pacing is good and the movie flows well from scene to scene. Chase scenes and action sequences aren't too long but fit well into the overall plot of the movie. The film even has great opening credits and an action scene that gives a nod to the first installment.
Writers Will Beall (Bad Boys: Ride or Die), Tom Gormican (That Awkward Moment), and Kevin Etten (The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent), on the other hand, dial in the story and it shows. From almost the beginning it is obvious who the villain is, and the story seems put together with masking tape full of holes. Some aspects are glossed over very quickly as if the writers didn't want to take the time to fully flesh out the plot and there isn't much character development from some of the newly introduced individuals like Grant. This is a recycled plot that they didn't even try to disguise as something new and interesting.
If you love Axel Foley, Eddie Murphy, Beverly Hills Cop, and its soundtracks you will enjoy this latest installment. If you like to laugh and find the other movies in this franchise funny (well one and two at least), then you will like this movie. If you want some mindless fun "ditto" but if you are looking for tons of action or don't like 1980s humor, then you can skip this one. The second iteration of Beverly Hills Cop, Bad Boys, will be more to your liking.
Overall, at sixty-three years of age, Murphy doesn't look his age (though the same can't be said for some of the other cast members) and he's still "got it".
Grade: B
