The Beverly Hills Cop films make up one of the most successful comedy franchises in box office history, thanks in large part to Eddie Murphy’s bona fide movie star performances as Detroit cop Axel Foley.
After 30 years since the widely panned third installment, Murphy returned as Foley in this month’s Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F on Netflix.
With Murphy returning to one of his defining roles after three decades, it’s worth looking back at the series and ranking how these seismic comedy films stack up against each other.
With four installments, there aren’t many to rank. However, it’s still fascinating to look back on the varying levels of success Murphy and company found with these buddy cop movies.
Series co-star Bronson Pinchot noted in 2009 that Murphy seemed “very low-spirited, low-energy” on the film’s set, as the film came during a downward slope in Murphy’s illustrious career. In fact, Murphy has recently been critical of the unsuccessful third installment in the series, and it’s not hard to understand why. John Landis stepping in and infusing more of his patented shtick felt like such an aggressive departure from Tony Scott’s more gritty second installment, and setting almost the entirety of the film at a Disney World knockoff still doesn’t make a ton of sense when the previous two installments had grounded themselves in Murphy’s gleeful subversion of 1980s Beverly Hills’ yuppie utopia.
Even if he was somber on the set, Murphy does his best to lift the sagging plot with his charm. Even so, Foley running around Wonderworld just doesn’t hit the same as him driving around the streets of Beverly Hills. If the film has a couple of virtues, it’s a fascinating curio of its time, and Judge Reinhold thrives with the added attention on Billy Rosewood. Even if the film isn’t very good, you can’t ever say this one is boring.
Making a comedy sequel is tough, as you’re constantly trying to play the same beats that made people love what came before all while trying to justify why viewers can’t just stay home and watch the original. Beverly Hills Cop II feels like a movie pushing against itself; it’s all at once trying to recapture lightning in a bottle all while giving an in-demand Tony Scott the space he needs to make, well, a Tony Scott movie. The results are more satisfying than not, as Murphy’s never-ending ability to make you laugh and Scott’s steady hand at the wheel more than compensate for repeated story beats. The film’s third act takes an uptick for the better and really delivers the unique blend of thrills and snark that made the original such a classic. Once you really get going with the story, this is a dutiful sequel with a good bit to like.
The long-gestating fourth installment in the series is a pretty big win, finding a nice blend between the breezy tone of the first installment and the kind of emotional heft that typically accompanies a legacy sequel. Adding in excellent actors like Taylour Paige, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Kevin Bacon and Luis Guzmán never hurts, nor does Murphy slipping right back into his Detroit Lions garb and Foley charisma with complete and total ease. While the film parallels the original in pretty recognizable ways (like most legacy sequels do), there’s more than enough separation to help the wiser elements of aged characters settle. The fourth film is a rousing success compared to what came before it, even if you can tell that this is absolutely a movie designed for streaming. The star isn’t, however, and it’s really special that we got Murphy in his absolute silver screen star mode as Foley again.
You can’t compete with the original. It’s the film that launched Murphy into absolute superstardom and the best collision of what makes this franchise work. Between the bananas in the tailpipe to all of Foley’s devastatingly funny alter egos, the original film stands tall for being one of the great comedies of the 1980s and a gripping cop drama on top of that. We’re always going to compare any future films in this series to the first, as it should be.
