RENO 911! MIAMI

Director: Robert Ben Garant
Stars: Carlos Alazraqui, Mary Birdsong, Robert Ben Garant, Kerri Kenney-Silver, Thomas Lennon, Wendi McLendon-Covey, Niecy Nash, Cedric Yarbrough
Year: 2007
Rating: R

Like the show? Then chances are you'll like the movie just as much. Parts are lame, parts are truly hilarious (including the ending) - and it's all completely insane. For those who haven't seen the show, it's basically a "Cops" parody, where cameras follow the lamest cops ever - Reno, Nevada sheriff's department - as they answer 911 calls and deal with crime on Reno's streets.

For the film, the most inept sheriff's department in the world decides to take a break and attend a law enforcement convention they've been "invited" to in Miami. Actually, they haven't been invited - it's open to all law enforcement personnel - but the gang is still surprised when they show up, and no hotel rooms (or hell, even convention badges) have been allotted to their squad for the festivities. Instead, the officers are forced to check into a fleabag motel full of hookers and drug dealers (that, scarily, reminded me a LOT of the first motel I stayed in, on my first trip to Miami!) - and after a night of drunken debauchery/attempted debauchery (and not a little hilarity), the squad shows up at the convention center the next day ... only to learn that a terrorist group has indulged in some biological warfare, and the entire convention center has been quarantined until an antidote can be found. In other words, there is now NO - ZIP - ZERO law enforcement on the streets of Miami ... so the Feds enlist the aid of the Reno sheriff's department (the only law enforcement squad not infected) to keep the peace on one of America's most crime-ridden cities.

God help us all.

The rest of the film follows the various officers as they respond (eventually) to the emergency calls coming into the Miami police station. Deputy Clementine Johnson (Wendi McLendon-Covey) is also on her own personal mission to discover the identity of the mystery man whose face she had forever tattooed on her left breast that first drunken night in town. Meanwhile, the officers deal with meandering crocodiles, a whiny acting-mayor (Ratatouille's Patton Oswalt, who is nothing short of hilarious here), Suge Knight's birthday party, perverts at the beach - and a Latin drug dealer named Ethan (played by Paul Rudd, whose comic talents I earned a whole new respect for here), among other problems. When they get a lead on Mr. Big, the leader of the terrorists, and blow that lead BIG-TIME, Reno's not-so-finest are relieved of their duties - and become more determined then ever to show they can crack the case and save the city.

Thomas Lennon, as Lt. Dangle (possibly the only law office in the country who got hot pants approved as part of his official uniform), is funnier than ever leading the gang, and (as in the show) Kerri Kenney-Silver, as Deputy Terry Wiegel, is laugh-out-loud funny no matter what she does (Lennon and Kenney-Silver's "sex scene" together - while ... odd - is one of the highlights of the film). The final chase scene, done in golf carts, is funny enough alone to elevate the film from the 2-1/2 reels I was originally thinking of giving it. Probably only for fans of the show - but well worth it, if you are. *** - Reel Cool