Chips
2 stars
Director: Dax Shepard
Stars: Michael Peña, Dax Shepard, Jessica McNameeh
Duration: 200 mins
Class: 15
KRS Releasing Ltd
Those of you my age (ahem) may remember the popular TV series Chips, which ran from 1977 to 1983. The series followed the daily lives on the job of clean-cut and heroic California highway patrol officers Jon Baker and Frank ‘Ponch’ Poncherello as they rode around California’s highways keeping them safe.
It was, by today’s standards, a pretty lightweight, non-violent drama, with the protagonists and their colleagues on the force doing lots of good and saving lives as they dealt with various commuters and the odd criminal they came into contact with via myriad car accidents and so on.
I will confess to having spent many hours watching them on TV many, many years ago. Looking back however, (and I did, thank you, You Tube) it all seems rather anodyne, and it must be said, it really hasn’t aged well – though admittedly, its whiter than white innocence does have a certain charm. The filmmakers clearly saw something worthwhile in it, enough to bring this remake to the big screen more than 30 years later.
Fans of the show will find little that is recognisable and much that deserves their opprobrium
Well, as it happens, nostalgia was certainly not on the cards, for all they lifted from the TV show were the names of the two protagonists and their job, for otherwise, fans of the show will find little that is recognisable and much that deserves their opprobrium – just like the show’s original Jon Baker, actor Larry Wilcox, who has been quite open in his criticism of the film.
Led by director/writer/star Dax Shepard, CHIPS the movie goes down the action/comedic route – with little action of note and plenty of comedic misfires. Jon Baker (Shepard) is a rather pathetic pill-popping, former X Games (extreme sports) moto-cross star who wants to get into the highway patrol so his vapid, shallow ex-wife Karen (Kirsten Bell) will take him back. He is partnered by new transfer Frank ‘Ponch’ Poncherello (Michael Peña), actually an FBI agent gone undercover within the CHP to identify the corrupt cops behind a series of armoured vehicle robberies. The two couldn’t be more different in temperament and approach but, as the trope dictates, it’s the mismatched partners who make a funny buddy movie.
Yet, the funny doesn’t really register at all, with most of it mined unsuccessfully from Baker’s addiction and his bizarre penchant for spouting self-help clichés at Ponch. A running gag about the latter’s apparent homophobia and anger management issues never really registers. This culminates in a scene where Baker’s nether regions are stuffed in Ponch’s horrified face, which is supposed to have us splitting out sides with laughter, when all we are doing is rolling our eyes.
Also, Ponch is a man’s man, and his addiction is sex (with women). We are reminded time and time again via gratuitous shots of ladies’ Lycra-clad backsides; ladies who are for the most part referred to as “booty” or “hotties”. One scene has Ponch inadvertently sexting the wrong woman with pretty dire – and still unfunny – circumstances.
It would be marginally less troglodytic had there been some three-dimensional female characters to balance out the misogyny. Alas, Karen is sketched as little more than a heartless bitch (Kristen Bell deserves better, though given she is Shepard’s wife in real life I guess she did hubby a favour); while the protagonists’ female colleagues line up to become romantic interests or the butt (excuse the pun) of bad jokes.
All the performances are pretty one-note. Shepard and Pena pretty much mug their way through their lines, and even a usually reliably solid character actor like Vincent D’Onofrio, as CHP veteran Lieutenant Ray Kurtz, struggles to make a mark. All in all, the lazy characterisation, perfunctory script and equally mediocre action – surprising for a film about motorcycle cops – add up to a movie that simply fires on no cylinders.