Movie Reviews

As their appearance on the Academy Awards proves, in my opinion, Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson are hilarious just standing next to one another. They don't need to be talking or making silly faces or anything. Just stick them next to one another, and the sum of the two actors is somehow funnier than most of what they'd do on their own. That's what really works in Starsky & Hutch: the comedic chemistry between Stiller as the dull do-gooder cop David Starsky, and Wilson as his somewhat careless and erratic partner Ken "Hutch" Hutchinson.

There's nothing really special about the plot here. Starsky and Hutch are unwillingly paired together as partners by their commanding sergeant, and together they set off investigating a small-time drug dealer (Vince Vaughn) who tries to organize his biggest sale, with occasional help from another sleazy drug-dealer -- a snitch named Huggy Bear (Snoop Dogg). It's pretty standard "buddy-cop" fare, really, where they pretty much hate each other -- fighting and bickering throughout -- until they realize how much better they both are when they're together. There's a very subtle and under-played hint of an "attraction" that develops between them, which I'm not sure was ever present in the original TV show, but which I thought was really funny.

The humour in the film approaches something like slapstick at times (somewhat like what you'd find in the Naked Gun trilogy) but it never really goes over the top into sheer goofiness, which is good because all of the characters other than Starsky and Hutch are played completely straight -- including Vaughn's character, who unfortunately isn't really given a single funny thing to do in the film. Snoop Dogg plays his role very well though, which is understandable I guess, considering I can't imagine him as being anything other than sleazy.

Stiller and Wilson are the stars of the show, however, and Starsky & Hutch is very much worth seeing just because of them.