Good guys and bad guys make screen mayhem

Press, 6 October 1987, Page 14

Good guys and bad guys make screen mayhem

During the course of "Armed and Dangerous,” security man Frank Dooley gets to deliver a speech that would do justice to a John Wayne movie.

He delivers it deadpan to his partners, who are about to embark on a dangerous mission in the cause of right. Dooley tells them: “The point is this: there’s good guys and there’s bad guys. There’s right and there’s wrong, and there comes a time in every man’s life when he’s got to take a stand, and this time is now.”

The irony is that unlike John Wayne’s screen pronouncements, this one is delivered by a fat man in a dress and an outrageous blond wig, and makeup, and his partner is dressed in a leather-boy outfit with no seat in his black trousers.

It sets the tone for this accomplished dose of screen mayhem, which sets out to do for private security firms what “Police Academy” did for the police.

It is also something of a costume comedy. As one of the male leads, John Candy gets to dress up as a policeman, a transvestite and some kind of caped crusader with a buffalo gun strapped to his hip. Harold Ramis co-wrote the screenplay with Peter Torokvei. Their collective credits include "Ghostbusters,” “National Lampoon’s Animal House,” “Stripes,” “Real Genius,” and “Back to School.”

That certainly explains the sense of fun that runs right through this 84-min-ute video. However, unlike some of those earlier scripts, this one does have its serious side, and people do get hurt. The problem is that Guard Dog Security, a private firm, has been financed by the Mob and it is now determined to use the business to help along its own money-mak-ing schemes. The other problem is that the police are also crooked, and in the pay of the Mob. Into this mess, in a dark alley one dark night, stumbles police officer

Dooley, a nine-year veteran of the force. He finds his fellow officers stealing some television sets, but is framed for the burglary himself. His partner on the security firm’s rounds is to be Norman Kane, played by Eugene Levy, who is a lawyer so inept that a judge suggests he should look for another career.

Candy does not have a character that has to be played strictly for laughs, in spite of his flab and his costumes. This honest excop is basically capable, and has a hard core — a determination to deal with the bad guys. Both he and Levy are products of the Torontobased company, S.C.T.V., which also launched such comedians as Dan Ackroyd and Rick Moranis (both of “Ghostbusters”) and Billy Crystal. As the film heads towards its climax, Security Man Dooley makes his way to a violent rendezvous to the tune of the “Easy Rider” theme, “Bom to Be Wild,’' but this time it is played with sarcasm. He is dressed in an ancient motorcyclist’s costume, and astride an equally ancient motorcycle. The film is marked by a lot of clever chase sequences, complete with crates of minced vegetables and enormous explosions.

“Armed and Dangerous” is rated M, and has been released by RCA, Columbia, and Hoyts. It is a good comedy, well intentioned, inclined to some occasional bad language, but well-paced and entertaining. —D.C.