Beverly Hills Cop II
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| Beverly Hills Cop II | |
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| Directed by | Tony Scott |
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| Produced by | Don Simpson Jerry Bruckheimer |
| Written by | Characters: Danilo Bach Daniel Petrie, Jr. Story: Eddie Murphy Robert D. Wachs Screenplay: Larry Ferguson Warren Skaaren Uncredited: David Giler Dennis Klein |
| Starring | Eddie Murphy Judge Reinhold Jurgen Prochnow Ronny Cox John Ashton Brigitte Nielsen Allen Garfield Dean Stockwell Gil Hill Gilbert Gottfried and Paul Reiser |
| Music by | Harold Faltermeyer |
| Editing by | Billy Weber |
| Distributed by | Paramount Pictures |
| Release date(s) | May 20, 1987 |
| Running time | 100 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Gross revenue | $299,965,036 (worldwide) |
| Preceded by | Beverly Hills Cop |
| Followed by | Beverly Hills Cop III |
Beverly Hills Cop II is a 1987 action-comedy film starring Eddie Murphy and directed by Tony Scott. It is the first sequel in the Beverly Hills Cop series. Murphy returns as Detroit police detective Axel Foley, who returns to Beverly Hills, California to track down a group of international munitions smugglers involved in a series of armed robberies. He reunites with Beverly Hills detectives Billy Rosewood (Judge Reinhold) and John Taggart (John Ashton) to stop the gang after their friend, Captain Bogomil (Ronny Cox), is a victim to one of their crimes.
Taglines:
"Axel Foley is back. Back where he doesn't belong."
"The heat's back on!"
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[edit] Plot
Approximately two years after the original film, Captain (formerly Lieutenant) Andrew Bogomil (Ronny Cox), Detective Billy Rosewood (Judge Reinhold), and Sergeant John Taggart (John Ashton) 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, headed by an incompetent and verbally abusive new police chief named Harold Lutz (Allen Garfield), who is doing everything he can to stay on Mayor Ted Egan's (Robert Ridgely) good side. Unimpressed when Rosewood calls the FBI to help solve the case, Lutz holds Bogomil responsible as commanding officer and suspends him, despite Bogomil trying to convince him that Rosewood was only following a hunch, a traditional aspect of police work. Lutz also punishes Taggart and Rosewood by placing them on traffic duty.
On the way home, Bogomil is shot by Karla Fry (Brigitte Nielsen), the chief henchwoman of Maxwell Dent (Jürgen Prochnow). Finding out about the shooting over a news report, Axel Foley (Murphy) immediately flies out to Beverly Hills (covering his absence from his actual job in Detroit by telling his commanding officer Inspector Todd he was going "deep deep deep DEEP undercover" on the credit card fraud case he had been assigned to) to help find out who shot Bogomil to repay the favor he owes him for saving his job two years ago. Taggart and Rosewood agree to assist Axel because of Lutz's apparent attempts to find an excuse to get them fired. Posing as an undercover FBI agent to get past Lutz (by convincing his would-be partner Jeffrey in Detroit to pose as Todd to intercept Lutz's phone call to Todd's office and convince Lutz that Axel is part of a multi-jurisdictional task force). Axel soon starts making the connection between the robberies and Dent, and has Bogomil's daughter Jan use her connections as an insurance agent to find out Dent's financial dealings. Dent is robbing his own businesses to finance firearms deals and is discreetly using his henchman Charles Cain (Dean Stockwell) as the front man for his operations. Bogomil was shot due to being on the right track with his investigation into the case.
Having foiled a robbery attempt at a bank depository, Axel is able to trick Dent's accountant into using his computer and discovers that Dent and Karla are planning to leave the country, and he learns from Jan that all of Dent's businesses have gone under except his Race Track, which he is convinced is the next target. On the way Axel solves the latest riddle sent to the police, and is convinced that this riddle was intended for the cops to solve so Dent could implicate Cain as the Alphabet Bandit (which Axel is aware that Cain is not intelligent enough to be the Alphabet Bandit, having met him personally at Dent's gun club).
The three arrive too late to stop the robbery and find Cain's body (who was shot by Karla) among the casualties. While Lutz announces publicly that the Alphabet Crimes have been solved, Axel notices some red mud at the stables, which leads him, Taggart and Rosewood to Dent's Oil Field where Dent is making his final arms deal. The three of them then engage in a shootout with everyone involved in the deal. Dent confronts Axel in the warehouse, but Axel gets distracted and Dent walks into the shadows. Dent then crashes through the wall in his car and Axel shoots Dent through the windshield, sending his car down a hill and erupting in flames. Karla appears and is about to kill Axel, but is shot dead by Taggart.
Just as the last thugs are about to flee, the police arrive upon the scene, along with Lutz and Mayor Egan. Lutz tries to fire Rosewood and Taggart for their insubordination as well as arrest Axel. However, both Taggart and Rosewood stand up to Lutz this time and prove that Dent was the real Alphabet Bandit. They are also able to convince Mayor Egan of Lutz's actual incompetence, and the Mayor personally fires Lutz because he is tired of his abusive attitude towards his men.
At the end of the film Bogomil is chosen by Mayor Egan to replace Lutz as the new Chief of Police, and Axel returns back to Detroit, but not before he gets chewed out by Inspector Todd over the phone, right after Egan called him to congratulate him on allowing Axel to assist them on this case.
[edit] Cast
- Eddie Murphy as Detective Axel Foley
- Judge Reinhold as Detective Billy Rosewood
- John Ashton as Detective Sergeant John Taggert
- Jürgen Prochnow as Maxwell Dent
- Ronny Cox as Captain Andrew Bogomil
- Brigitte Nielsen as Karla Fry
- Allen Garfield as Police Chief Harold Lutz
- Dean Stockwell as Charles "Chip" Cain
- Paul Reiser as Detective Jeffrey Friedman
- Gil Hill as Inspector Douglas Todd
- Paul Guilfoyle as Nikos "Nik" Thomopolis
- Robert Ridgely as Mayor Ted Egan
- Alice Adair as Jan Bogomil
[edit] Cameos
- Paul Guilfoyle, best known as Detective Jim Brass on CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, has a small part as gun-runner Nikos Thomopolis. The best shot of him, complete with a full head of blond hair, can be seen in the scene at the Playboy Mansion.
- Gilbert Gottfried well known for his roles as Iago in Disney's Aladdin series, and Mr. Peabody in the Problem Child series appears briefly as Maxwell Dent's accountant Sydney Bernstein.
- Chris Rock made his film debut here in a small role as a valet. Rock was previously featured in an HBO comedy special which was produced by Eddie Murphy and Clint Smith. Chris Rock also worked with Eddie Murphy in the 1992 film, Boomerang.
- Ola Ray, famous for her appearance in Michael Jackson's video "Thriller", appears as one of the Playmates at Hefner's party.
[edit] Production
Paramount Pictures had planned a television series based on the first film. Murphy refused the series but was willing to do a sequel.[1]
The film was originally to be set and filmed in London and Paris. However, the script was re-written after Eddie Murphy expressed a reluctance to film outside the United States.
The film was the first American movie to utilize the concept of a laser security grid, although the scene would eventually be cut from the final release.
When Axel first meets Chief Lutz, he tells him he is Johnny Wishbone from the Isle of St. Croix. Upon their next meeting, Lutz says that he checked with Immigration and they had never heard of Johnny Wishbone. St. Croix is an island in the US Virgin Islands and therefore Immigration would have no record of anyone from there coming to the Continental U.S.
In the scene where the cops return to Rosewood's (Judge Reinhold) apartment, there is a poster of Sylvester Stallone's Cobra. This is a reference to the fact that Stallone was originally cast as Axel Foley. After being released from the movie, Stallone made Cobra, where Stallone put his ideas into. A Special Edition of Beverly Hills Cop I details Stallone's involvement in the film project. During filming of Beverly Hills Cop II, Stallone was married briefly to Brigitte Nielsen.
In the final shoot-out another reference to Stallone can be heard when Taggart says "Fuck Rambo." This is after Rosewood blows up a semi trailer with a rocket launcher (by accident, since he has never fired one before).
In the fingerprint scene in Rosewoods home, Murphy and Reinhold improvised the idea of humming the tune of "Spanish Flea", which they refer to Taggart as being from The Dating Game.
The AutoMag (pistol) handgun is stated as being the weapon of choice by the Alphabet bandits. Empty Auto Mag casings are even shown as key pieces of evidence from the first heist. However, no .44 Auto Mag was used by anyone in the film. Most of the bandits use Heckler & Koch MP5 submachine guns, which are 9 millimeters. At various points, Karla used a 9 millimeter and/or a .357 Magnum.
When Axel is searching the map coordinates the address of city deposit is 9752 Gregory way but when Taggart is calling for back-up he clearly says the address as 341 Gregory.
Chief Todd's office window has his name inscribed as G. TODD; however, in Beverly Hills Cop III, dialogue reveals that Todd's first name is Douglas.
In another scene after the City Deposit heist, as Murphy jumps up into the concrete truck, he drops his gun which can be seen briefly and in a change of camera view of the following scene you can see the gun in the street. And after Murphy reaches the armored truck to look through it he has his gun.
[edit] Soundtrack
The song "Hold On" as sung by Keta Bill plays during the scene wherein Axel, Rosewood, and Taggart confront Dent at the Playboy Mansion. However, the film's soundtrack CD released by MCA Records includes only a different song entitled "Hold On," sung by Corey Hart. This song has different music and slightly altered lyrics. According to Keta Bill, "They contracted with Corey Hart---he heard my version and quickly rewrote the song. When the movie people heard his version they were furious he did that----used my version in the movie, and had to keep their contract with him for the album."
The movie introduced George Michael's controversial song "I Want Your Sex". It also includes "Cross My Broken Heart" by The Jets and "Shakedown" by Bob Seger which became a #1 hit on the Billboard Hot 100, as well as "Better Way" performed by James Ingram.
As with the first movie, none of Harold Faltermeyer's soundtrack score has ever been released. However, Harold Faltermeyer's self titled album "Harold F," released in 1988, includes a song called "Bad Guys," which is apparently piece of score which plays during the opening jewelry store robbery scene and through several other scenes in the movie.
[edit] References
[edit] External links
- Boxoffice Information
- Beverly Hills Cop II at the Internet Movie Database
- Beverly Hills Cop II at Allmovie
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Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Beverly Hills Cop II |
| Preceded by Ishtar |
Box office number-one films of 1987 (USA) May 25, 1987 – June 7, 1987 |
Succeeded by Predator |
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