Beverly Hills Cop II 4K Review (Paramount)

Beverly Hills Cop II is a 1987 action comedy film directed by Tony Scott (True Romance, Revenge, The Last Boy Scout, The Hunger, Man on Fire, Top Gun, and Days of Thunder). It was written by Larry Ferguson (Highlander, Alien 3, The Hunt for Red October, and Rollerball) and Warren Skaaren (Batman, Beetlejuice, Top Gun, and Fire with Fire). It was produced by Jerry Bruckheimer (Beverly Hills Cop franchise, Bad Boys franchise, Top Gun, The Rock, Gemini Man, and Con Air) and Don Simpson (Days of Thunder, Top Gun, The Ref, Beverly Hills Cop, Crimson Tide, and Bad Boys). It was originally pitched as a television series but the producers decided to do a film due to the original having so much success. They wanted to take this sequel out of the United States to either London or Paris but Eddie Murphy turned down that idea quick. This is the first feature film that comedian Eddie Murphy wrote the story. A controversial affair took place during this production. The budget was $20 million and it grossed $300 million worldwide at the box office!!!!Beverly Hills Police Captain Andrew Bogomil (played by: Ronny Cox from Captain America, Taps, The Beast Within, and Steele Justice ), Detective Billy Rosewood (played by: Judge Reinhold from Running Scared, Roadhouse 66, Ruthless People, and The Santa Clause), and Sergeant John Taggart (played by: John Ashton from Borderline, King Kong Lives, Trapped in Paradise, and Little Big League) are trying to figure out who is behind the “Alphabet Crimes” a series of mostly high-end-store robberies distinguished by their monogrammed envelopes with an alphabetical sequence the assailants leave behind. Complicating matters is the new “political” state of the Beverly Hills Police Department, headed by incompetent and verbally abusive new police chief Harold Lutz (played by: Allen Garfield from The Majestic, The Ninth Gate, The Cotton Club, and Cyborg 2), who is doing everything he can to stay on Mayor Ted Egan’s (played by: Robert Ridgely from Boogie Nights, Fire Down Below, Philadelphia, and The Ref) good side. Unimpressed when Rosewood calls the FBI to help solve the case, Lutz holds Bogomil responsible as commanding officer and suspends him. Taggart and Rosewood are forced to do traffic duty. Bogomil is blindsided and shot by Maxwell Dent’s (played by: Jürgen Prochnowfrom Das Boot, Beerfest, Dune, and In the Mouth of Madness) enforcer Karla Fry (played by: Brigitte Nielsen from Cobra, Rocky IV, Red Sonja, and 976-Evil II).He is fighting for life in the hospital. Axel Foley (played by: Eddie Murphy from Shrek franchise, Doctor Dolittle 1/2, The Nutty Professor 1/2, and Life) ditches his current assignment in Detroit to go to Beverly Hills after hearing the bad news from his friends and Bogomil’s daughter Jan (played by: Alice Adair from Miami Vice and Quantum Leap). He asks his friend Jeffrey Friedman (played by: Paul Reiser from Mad About You, Stranger Things, Aliens, and Beverly Hills Cop) to cover him from his boss inspector Todd (played by: Gilbert R. Hill from Beverly Hills Cop franchise) while he’s gone. After some investigation and he finds out the ammunition was specially manufactured by Charles Cain (played by: Dean Stockwell from Quantum Leap, Blue Velvet, The Dunwich Horror, and To Live and Die in L.A.). He goes to the gun club where he runs into every possible suspect for these recent crimes. They find out that international arms dealer Nikos Thomopolis (played by: Paul Guilfoyle from CSI, Wall Street, L.A. Confidential, and The Serpent and the Rainbow) is buying weapons from Dent and his associates. Axel tricks Dent’s accountant Sidney Bernstein into giving him some critical information about his main suspect. With Lutz breathing down their neck and watching their every move, the three cops close in to solve their fiend’s attack plus the true indentity of the infamous “Alphabet Crimes” mastermind. Can they solve everything before Dent, Fry, and Cain escape for good????Beverly Hills Cop 2 amped everything up, it had all kinds of action and it was hilarious! I thought this one was the funniest entry from the BHC franchise. It had some slick one liners that had you laughing out loud like crazy. The chemistry between Eddie Murphy, Judge Reinhold, and John Ashton was better than ever here. I liked how they reversed things here, Axel was the one saving and helping them this time. Axel Foley is my all time favorite Eddie Murphy role, this is a great performance by the legendary comedian. The supporting cast was awesome in this sequel. The Billy character is crazy as hell in this, Judge has so much fun with the role here. It had a nice variety of villains here. Plus it was cool to see so many characters returning for this follow up. Tony Scott had his own style and he knew how to deliver when it came to action films. The cinematography was best in the series. The soundtrack and score was basically it’s own character in Beverly Hills Cop 2. It hit the right notes and set a mood for it. I think this movie is very under-rated, it’s just as good as the original. It might even be a little better, my opinion always changes on those two every few years because the replay value is strong for the first two films. I wish BHC 2 had it’s old extras added to this 4K plus get some brand new bonus material for this release but I will say it looks fantastic, HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!!!!Let’s talk about the high definition presentation from Paramount! This brand new 2160p (2.35:1) transfer with Dolby Vision and HDR10 looks great on 4K! I previously owned them on VHS, DVD, and the older U.K. blu ray release so I have plenty of sources to compare these new restorations to. This brand new UHD disc is a huge upgrade compared to any other home video release of this sequel. It’s loaded with a variety of audio options which includes English: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1, German: Dolby Digital 2.0, Spanish: Dolby Digital 2.0, French: Dolby Digital 2.0, Japanese Dolby Digital 5.1, and Russian Dolby Digital 5.1 on this 35th anniversary release. The dialogue is crystal clear, all the action plus comedic moments are elevated, and the amazing music has a killer boost to them. So many different subtitles are offered here which includes English, English SDH, French, German, Japanese, Portuguese, Spanish, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, Korean, Mandarin, Polish, and Russian. Paramount kills it on the technical aspects like always. Unfortunately, this UHD is a bare bones release with no extras at all. So make sure you hold on to the older DVD which feature some. It comes with a slipcover. It belongs in every comedy, action, and Eddie Murphy fan collections. It’s available everywhere right now, CHECK IT OUT!!!!