‘Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F’ and Everything That Came Before It

The latest in pop-culture news, recaps, and reviews, plus close reads, profiles, interviews, and more from Vulture.com. [Brand Logo]( movie review [The New Beverly Hills Cop Is a Predictable Retread, and I Don’t Care]( You can (justifiably) complain about its flaws, or you can relax and groove on its recycled rhythms. Photo: Netflix/Courtesy Everett Collection Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F. was not created by an algorithm, but you could be forgiven for thinking it was. Co-written by Will Beall, co-writer of [Bad Boys: Ride or Die](, and Tom Gormican and Kevin Etten, who wrote [The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent]( together, this attempt to revive a franchise that has sat dormant for the past 30 years goes out of its way to incorporate all the familiar things from the original three films. Less than a minute into the movie, released exclusively on Netflix, we hear the saxophone blasts of “The Heat Is On,” the Glenn Frey hit from the original Beverly Hills Cop. They are followed soon after by Bob Seger’s “Shakedown” from Beverly Hills Cop II and the Pointer Sisters’ “Neutron Dance,” echoing the first installment. In the opening montage, Eddie Murphy, still working [his wide-as-a-superhighway grin]( as Detroit detective Axel Foley, cruises around his city as images of everyday people on the streets flash by, a blatant callback to the intro that kicked off the franchise. [read more]( Vaulture [From the Archives: How We’ve Covered Eddie Murphy and (Every) Beverly Hills Cop]( Photo: New York Magazine New York has covered Saturday Night Live’s breakout talent from the very beginning — [starting with Chevy Chase, during its first season]( — and in 1982, anyone watching could tell you who the show’s biggest star was. [Eddie Murphy]( had joined the cast in December 1980, as SNL faced near-cancellation and furious backstage turmoil, and a year and a half later it was looking much funnier and better, in large part because of [Murphy as Gumby](, [Murphy as Mr. Robinson](, [Murphy as Buckwheat](, and Murphy as almost anything else he did on camera. He was, incredibly, just 17 when he first appeared on Weekend Update. Chet Flippo, profiling him for us a year and a half after that debut, visited Murphy (still only 19!) at his mother and stepfather’s house in Long Island, and got, by today’s celebrity-profile standards, a breathtaking amount of access. Murphy is thoughtful about his career and his comedy, and (predictably) pretty funny when he’s just goofing around. “All these kids playing video games,” he remarks at one point, “boy, I’ll tell you, in 20 years we’re gonna have a race of destructive kids who are stupid because they didn’t go to school. But they’ll have great reflexes.” His time on SNL led, of course, to big-screen comedies, notably [Beverly Hills Cop]( and two immediate sequels — plus a third, out this week under the title Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F. David Denby, our longtime critic, was quite perceptive about the original, noting that Murphy’s big braying laugh—which could seem malicious and mocking if you weren’t paying attention—was in fact quite affectionate, especially toward the ridiculousness of Beverly Hills’ wealthy inhabitants. “Eddie Murphy has a broad, generous streak,” Denby writes. “He wants the world to be a faster place; he wants everyone to be a little hipper.” Which is not to say that Denby loved the sequels, which he calls “terrible” (II) and “dreadful” (III). In fact, he published an essay in which he cites Beverly Hills Cop II specifically to demonstrate the terrible lessons Hollywood was learning about commercial moviemaking. Its huge success, he wrote, was coaxing studios toward highly predictable products and directors, and away from interesting weirdos that might break out. Given the hollowing-out of non-IP-driven commercial filmmaking that we’ve seen in the past few years, it’s a striking prediction of what’s to come (or maybe an affirmation that it was ever thus). “Studio executives,” he wrote, “… want to realize their own ideas. But their ideas pulverize movies — they make the notion of movies as an art form impossible. And irrelevant.” Note from the future: If you don’t have an Eddie Murphy level of talent in those movies, your executive producers’ dumb notes are not going to help you. —Christopher Bonanos, city editor The Reviews [BEVERLY HILLS COP, Michael Chapman, Eddie Murphy, Lisa Eilbacher, Jonathan Banks, 1984] [BEVERLY HILLS COP, Michael Chapman, Eddie Murphy, Lisa Eilbacher, Jonathan Banks, 1984] Photo: ©Paramount/Courtesy Everett Col/©Paramount/Courtesy Everett Col ➽ [Beverly Hills Cop (1984)]( ➽ [Beverly Hills Cop II (1987)]( ➽ [Beverly Hills Cop III (1994)]( ➽ [And a bonus essay on BHCII]( Plus: Gossip Through the Years A tuna-fish sandwich (1990) … [Hot Night with Murphy Means Cold Tuna: Some guests at Cafe Society wish they could have traded places with Eddie Murphy. The actor wowed the crowd when he stopped by recently with an entourage of five bodyguards. “He went to the edge of the balcony and selected the women he wanted to meet,” says Cafe Society owner Shelly Abramowitz. “It was funny to watch. Like something you’d expect Elvis Presley to do — but not Eddie Murphy.” Then, says Abramowitz, Murphy chose the women he wanted to leave with. “He picked the restaurant’s hostess and a customer,” Abramowitz says. “The hostess was really psyched because she thought she was going to have a hot night on the town of Eddie Murphy. But instead, he went home to New Jersey with her, and they had tuna-fish sandwiches in his kitchen. Then he had his chauffeur drive her back to her Manhattan home.” “That’s not quite the way it happened,” says Murphy’s spokeswoman. “He didn’t leave with anyone.” He invited some people back to his house. It wasn’t a ‘date’ thing.” She wouldn’t comment on the tuna fish.] [Hot Night with Murphy Means Cold Tuna: Some guests at Cafe Society wish they could have traded places with Eddie Murphy. The actor wowed the crowd when he stopped by recently with an entourage of five bodyguards. “He went to the edge of the balcony and selected the women he wanted to meet,” says Cafe Society owner Shelly Abramowitz. “It was funny to watch. Like something you’d expect Elvis Presley to do — but not Eddie Murphy.” Then, says Abramowitz, Murphy chose the women he wanted to leave with. “He picked the restaurant’s hostess and a customer,” Abramowitz says. “The hostess was really psyched because she thought she was going to have a hot night on the town of Eddie Murphy. But instead, he went home to New Jersey with her, and they had tuna-fish sandwiches in his kitchen. Then he had his chauffeur drive her back to her Manhattan home.” “That’s not quite the way it happened,” says Murphy’s spokeswoman. “He didn’t leave with anyone.” He invited some people back to his house. It wasn’t a ‘date’ thing.” She wouldn’t comment on the tuna fish.] … and a shady BHC III mention (1994) [ Eddie Murphy may be thinking it’s time to get back to his roots. Murphy recently went to Home Box Office to discuss the possibility of creating specials or a series for the pay-cable network. But Murphy’s HBO B.O. is no longer a given, either. HBO executives were overheard telling his ex-Golden Child, No offense, Eddie, but let’s see how Beverly Hills Cop III does before getting into bed here. Both Murphy’s people and HBO confirmed that the actor has talked to the network, but an HBO spokesman emphasized, “These are very preliminary discussions.” If the poor reviews of BHC III actually manage to correlate with box office — a distinct possibility this time — Murphy might consider contacting the people over at Comedy Central, or perhaps USA: Up All Night. ] [ Eddie Murphy may be thinking it’s time to get back to his roots. Murphy recently went to Home Box Office to discuss the possibility of creating specials or a series for the pay-cable network. But Murphy’s HBO B.O. is no longer a given, either. HBO executives were overheard telling his ex-Golden Child, No offense, Eddie, but let’s see how Beverly Hills Cop III does before getting into bed here. Both Murphy’s people and HBO confirmed that the actor has talked to the network, but an HBO spokesman emphasized, “These are very preliminary discussions.” If the poor reviews of BHC III actually manage to correlate with box office — a distinct possibility this time — Murphy might consider contacting the people over at Comedy Central, or perhaps USA: Up All Night. ] We’ve Been Working the Beverly Hills Cop Sequel Beat ➽ [Eddie Murphy Would Rather Retire Than Work With Brett Ratner (2008)]( ➽ [Paramount Demands the Immediate Removal of Vulture’s Fake Beverly Hills Cop IV Script (2008)]( ➽ [Eddie Murphy Says He’s Not Bitter, Not a ‘Recluse,’ and Not Making Beverly Hills Cop IV (2011)]( ➽ [Brett Ratner to Direct Beverly Hills Cop 4 (2013)]( ➽ [Looking at the Planned 2008 Version of Beverly Hills Cop IV (2014)]( ➽ [Beverly Hills Cop IV Set for a Spring 2016 Release (2014)]( ➽ [Eddie Murphy’s Beverly Hills Cop IV Is Moving Forward with New Directors (2016)]( ➽ [Beverly Hills Cop: Axel Foley Is Finally Happening (2024)]( [Today’s BHC-Themed Cinematrix]( Can you name an Eddie Murphy movie with a number in the title? 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