On a nostalgic evening, Ryan, the former high school quarterback who’s now an out-of-work teacher, and Justin, a video game developer working for a soulless employer, reminisce about the good old days and the promise they made: if they weren’t successful by 30, they would return to their home town in Ohio. Invited to a costume party, they go as cops and suddenly realize the uniform gives them the respect they have never had. Unable to let go, they decide to keep up the pretence, acquiring a police car and playing along to the point where they’re suddenly involved with the mob…

Picture gallery

From the very start, Let’s Be Cops is what the title says: two ordinary guys, written to click with the masses, off on a wacky adventure driven by their charming stupidity. The buddy cop movie has become so popular since Lethal Weapon and Bad Boys that pretty much every studio now has a department that makes them. Luke Greenfield’s movie therefore goes down already beaten tracks, from the bland romantic interest played by Nina Dobrev, to the bearded bad guys. The only thing the comedy has going for it is the team of Jake Johnson and Damon Wayans, Jr., who proved their energy in the sitcom New Girl. But the worst aspect of Let’s Be Cops is its timing, released in the wake of 21 Jump Street and its sequel, which artfully demolished the clichés of the genre. With the best will in the world, it’s impossible not to catalogue Let’s Be Cops under “outdated buddy flick”.