LOL is great. LOL is uplifting. LOL positively affects mental health by helping overcome stress and decreasing stress hormones in the blood. Having said that, sometimes LOL is just not enough. Sometimes a step up from LOL is needed.
It’s been quite some time since I saw a great comedy. Arguably, the last one was Dumb and Dumber, which has been the bar I have used to rate comedies ever since. Sadly, most modern comedies fail to reach that bar. They are watchable, but not great.
Sometimes, the movies I find the funniest are the unintentional comedies. Generally, they are action movies, like sequels to Fast and Furious, that are so far-fetched that they morph into comedies. Die Hard sequels fit that category, too.
Other times, movies that intend to be a combination of action and comedy become pure comedies for me, as I view the action scenes as modern-day slapstick schticks—the more over the top they are, the more intense they try to be, the funnier they become.
Pam and I watched one such movie last night: Beverly Hills Cop Axel F. Because we live in Beverly Hills, we had to watch it. Because on Father’s Day, I saw the helicopter used in the movie as I was strolling down Rodeo Drive enjoying the car show, we had to watch it. Because we heard the explosions on Wilshire Boulevard as they filmed one of the gunfight scenes, we had to watch it. Because we had seen the original over forty years ago, we had to watch it. That does not mean we expected to enjoy it. But we did.
On the surface, it should have been tolerable at best, a movie with a mindlessly predictable script containing lots of needlessly long action scenes. When we began to watch it two nights ago, I had to turn it off, thinking it was just too stupid and vapid to warrant watching. Maybe it was the foul mood I was in due to some work-related stress. Maybe it was because we had not seen a quintessential Eddie Murphy comedy in a long time. Who knows why, but we shut it off during the opening scene. I’m glad we opted to re-start it last night.
Once we turned it back on, something clicked. Something resonated with me. Maybe it was the comfort of watching scenes filmed in our backyard. Maybe it was the supporting cast. Maybe it was the lighthearted nature of the “intense” scenes. Maybe not. Maybe it was all about Eddie Murphy. In no time, I was laughing out loud—with regularity—and really enjoying the movie.
When it was over, I realized that I had just done more laughing than I had done in a long time—in short, I had spent a couple of hours LMAO.
And I felt a lot better for having done so.