Police Academy
(1984)
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When the Police Academy adopts a completely open admissions policy, no height or weight restriction, and most worryingly no intelligence tests. Hence a large number of unemployable social misfits promptly enroll. The academy instructors have the most difficult wave of recruits to train up: they include Laverne Hooks the tiny voiced woman; Karen Thompson the sociopath (Kim Cattrall); Eugene Tackleberry the firearm fan and Larvell Jones the walking sound-effect. Carey Mahoney (Steve Guttenburg) is a reluctant cadet of a different kind--he must last the course at the Academy as an alternative to jail. This hilarious motley crew are the last, blundering buffoons you would want as upholders of the law, as your protectors. The crooks never had it so good. |
It's hard to imagine that, back in 1984, anyone would have thought this would spawn six sequels as well as a cartoon series. However, somehow it managed to strike a chord with audiences around the world and made a star (well, briefly anyway) out of Steve Guttenberg. And, while the follow-ups became increasingly puerile as the series went on, the original film produces its fair share of belly laughs. Guttenberg leads a group of oddballs, who probably shouldn't even be allowed to watch cops on television, into police training, where they clash with authority but prove themselves in the end. It's crude and juvenile, but fans will be in heaven.