The Other Guys Review

Post-Anchorman, the shouty, bipolar everyman bit has seriously lost its clout.

As New York's finest, detectives Danson (Dwayne Johnson) and Highsmith (Samuel L Jackson) aren't just cops, they're supercops – for them busting crime, taking names and scoring ass is all in a day's work. Then there's the other guys. Partners Gamble (Will Ferrell) and Hoitz (Mark Wahlberg) are the pencil pushers of the NYPD. File work is their duty. Ink and staples are their ammo.

But when Danson and Highsmith come a cropper on the tail of some parkouring bank robbers, the stage is set for Gamble and Hoitz to become the new hot badges on the beat. As expected, things don't quite go to plan.

Adam McKay's directorial follow up to 2008's Step Brothers is decent enough as haphazard cop-coms go, but there's a distinct lack of restraint which means that, while some of the catchphrase humour hits the mark, The Other Guys is weighed down by its own self-awareness. Post-Anchorman, the shouty, bipolar everyman bit has seriously lost its clout.

Unlike Anchorman and Talladega Nights, the film's chief protagonists are just too predictable and, although Michael Keaton, Eva Mendes and Steve Coogan offer adequate support, you suspect McKay knows he can probably do a lot better.

Overall Ferrell and Wahlberg work the odd-couple buddy dynamic well, but their reliance on a cheap gag-heavy script means we never care enough about their respective personal issues or, indeed, whether or not they win their colleagues over and finally earn the respect they crave.