MovieChat Forums > Beverly Hills Cop II (1987) Discussion > WTF is wrong with this movie?

WTF is wrong with this movie?

posted 10 years ago by Nick7080
10 replies | jump to latest

I don't usually like to criticize some movie, but i have to say few words about Beverly Hills Cop 2. I know that there are fans of the movie who will probably be very pissed off at me because of this, but i have to mention it's not like i hate the movie. I can watch it as a time waster and have fun with some scenes and dialogue, but that's about it.

These are some problems that i have with movie;

Editing on Beverly Hills Cop 2 is really questionable. I watched this movie more times then i watched first one growing up and even when was kid i was always puzzled by some really strange parts of the movie, specially lousy editing.

Throughout the movie there are many examples of bad editing. There is so much scenes which really don't feel like something in director's Tony Scott's style. There are also some scenes which look like puzzle, with many of the pieces missing. Some scenes are edited in a way that they don't make sense. And continuity mistakes...I did read one report mentioning how there was some MPAA cuts made on movie but i don't think that's true.

As for story and dialogue...While i like some funny lines, in some of the dialogue scenes actors say their line without right emotion or expression. And the dialogue itself at times is not very good. Then there are some parts of plot that appear out of nowhere. Best example what i can think of is in the scene where Axel, Billy and Taggart just had shootout with couple of hitmens in car and in best (or should i say worst) example of bad editing, after hitmen's car is crashed, police cars and helicopter show up out of nowhere and police chief shows up in tuxedo. What, did they all just happen to be so close in neighbourhood?

And what's with action scenes? Shootouts are horribly directed, and this is Tony Scott directing the movie. Car crash scenes make no sense. We see a car going, we hear a sound of car crashing and then we see the aftermath.

Music - Score and soundtrack sound more like temp tracks then anything else. I saw lot of earlier cuts of movies like previews, workprints and stuff, and i swear because of the music and editing problems this movie looks like it's incomplete work-in-progress.

Once again, i don't want to sound like some btch pointing out mistakes but it's very hard nowdays to watch Beverly Hills Cop 2 without noticing all the problems it has.

I really would like to know what the hell was going on with editors and director while they were editing the movie. One of the reasons i like movies directed by Tony Scott is because of his style of filming and editing, but half of the time this movie doesn't feel like it's something that he made. I don't know should i blame editors, after seeing the lists of movies on which they worked i can see that they know their job.

For the end, when it comes to sequels of Eddie Murphy's action comedies, i will just say that i would rather watch Another 48 Hrs then Beveryl Hills Cop 2. And no, i'm not saying that either of the two movies is bad, but with all of its plot holes, Another 48 Hrs is hell of a lot better (for me) then BHC 2.

[–] rabbitmoon 10 years ago

I'm pretty sure that around this time, most of the crew and producers were off their faces with cocaine. So they probably botched a lot of shots, which they later did their best to edit in post.

[–] 10 years ago

[deleted]

[–] ItsEddieHaskellBeyotch 9 years ago

You have a lot to say but give little to no examples of how bad the editing and just about everything else is. I mean, you wrote ALL THAT just to pretty much repeat the same thing over and over.

If you're making a point, maybe you should use all that space to do so.

When theres no more room in Hollywood, remakes shall walk the Earth.

[–] BigRich 9 years ago

Best example what i can think of is in the scene where Axel, Billy and Taggart just had shootout with couple of hitmens in car and in best (or should i say worst) example of bad editing, after hitmen's car is crashed, police cars and helicopter show up out of nowhere and police chief shows up in tuxedo. What, did they all just happen to be so close in neighbourhood?

I'm glad you mentioned this scene. The black Z28 that crashed and Foley finds the match book inside, well, earlier in the movie the guy with the matchbook was in a black 3rd Gen Z28, but the Z28 that crashes was a 2nd Gen Z28! Clearly it was meant to be the same car otherwise why would it have the same passenger with the matchbook? I submitted this to the goof section years ago. Also, during this shootout, one of the taillight's fluctuates from being broken to not broken.

_
Every person that served can be called a veteran, but not every veteran can be called a Marine.

[–] Galagatron 9 years ago

Simpson and Bruckheimer might have been too occupied with the look and style of the movie, as with Tony Scott's direction, it was made to look like "Top Gun".

[–] omega_pinion 9 years ago

I do believe this was Tony Scott's first action movie & he did not really know how to handle this type of movie until later on in his career. It is no secret Tony Scott was abusing drugs(he also had an affair with Brigitte Neilsen during the shoot)
Going blind from CGI

[–] TMC-4 (19451) 6 years ago

I do wonder how much better BHC2 could've turned out had Martin Brest returned to direct? BHC2 rightly or wrongly, feels like it needed to ape the success of Top Gun (which was Paramount's biggest movie and the biggest movie period of 1986) with the overly saturated orange hues, smokey cinematography, and lightning quick editing.

[–] Mydarkstar (108) 5 years ago

This movie is essentially a testament of just how huge Eddie Murphy was in '87. He was so popular people were willing to overlook all of the crap in this movie such as the sloppiness and dialog as long as Eddie was on the screen.

I think a lot of the sloppiness you've named was just covered up by slicked-up music and very dramatic crashes - even if those crashes make no sense.

And you named the music. And yes, it sounds like complete crap when you watch it now, but that lazy synth crap was pretty popular in '87.

My biggest complaint is just the all out idiocy of the entire movie. And I'm not even talking about the actual plot. I mean all of the ridiculous circumstances which are thrown into the movie just as comedy opportunities. Like Axl swindling that house. WTF was that ?!?! Who the hell came up with that idea for a plot element ?!?! Ok, he shows up tells them the most ridiculous s##t about 90 degree angles. The construction works slap their foreheads and shake their heads and leave - and don't even come back ! First of all, they would never leave, or at the very worse they would leave and be back in about 5 minutes !!!!

And then there's the completely over the top indulging of having Axl show up at the Playboy mansion. That's almost as idiotic as the house scene.

And basically every single character who Axl deals with is the biggest idiot on the planet.

When I was 13 it was funny as hell. But then by the time I was 16 my friends and I were watching it on cable and just looking at each other laughing at the idiocy of the flick, not the actual comedy.

[–] Washingtonnative (2613) 5 years ago

Whats wrong with it? Well, it's absolutely nothing like the original movie. Plus it mostly focuses on being constantly action packed as opposed to adding laughs.

[–] moviechatterer (13465) 3 years ago

i didnt notice any of that stuff when watching it fairly regularly on VHS 30 odd years ago , but i was less discerning back then