Movie #39 - Beverly Hills Cop II

"The Heat's Back On!"

A pretty cheesy tagline if you ask me. However, much better than the first movie... although the whole franchise does not rank in any Top 10 list trilogies out there. These movies are strictly fun films to enjoy, especially if you are a fan of the 80's. And, like The Godfather trilogy, many tend to forget that they even made Beverly Hills Cop III - many years later and way beyond its shelf life.

Eddie Murphy (Axle Foley) is at it again, returning to Beverly Hills to help Judge Reinhold and John Ashton (Det. Rosewood and Det. Taggert) to solve a set of alphabet crimes. What makes this film interesting is the casting of Brigitte Nielsen, who at the time was one of the hottest women in Hollywood - recently married to Sylvester Stallone, cast in a number of action flicks as the leading lady - you get the picture. I still liked her better in Rocky IV, but that's another blog entry entirely.

Jurgen Prochnow (Maxwell Dent) plays the villain in this movie... a far cry from his Jesus Christ casting in The Seventh Sign. And once again, we have some brief cameos of Paul Reiser, attempting to be funny as Murphy's mischievous sidekick from Detroit - like anyone would believe Reiser was from Detroit - yeah right, has anyone seen an episode of Mad About You?

Anyhow... the movie is much better than the first film, mainly because many of the jokes and plot twists are expected and the relationships are already established. In terms of movie accomplishments, this is definitely Judge Reinhold's best film ever... however, many would argue that either Zandalee or Fast Times at Ridgemont High were better films for him. I beg to differ.