Review of The Other Guys (2010) by Shiira — 11 Aug 2010

Just like Thelma and Louise, who drove their 1964 Ford Convertible into the Grand Canyon, Highsmith(Samuel L. Jackson) and Danson(Dwayne Johnson) commit suicide, when the former says, "Aim for the bushes," just before they plunge to their deaths from a high building.

It's an inside joke; they can't aim for the "bushes" anymore. It's Highsmith who says, "All the sex we don't have with women but we have to," at a press conference celebrating their latest heroics.

Highsmith's bragging, a self-homage to he and his partner's legendary cocksmanship with the ladies, also has a double meaning, which becomes self-evident after their shocking demise. The reckless abandon that both men had brought to their pursuing of the drug dealers at the film's outset, now looks less like bravery, and more like a death wish.

Homoeroticism, after all, is an open secret when "buddy movies" are concerned, but normally, such bromance innuendos are relegated to the subtext, a laughing matter. But the machismo of Highsmith and Danson seems so excessive, so flamboyantly straight, their virility quickly turns into burlesque.

Played for laughs, "The Other Guys", on one level, satirizes every action film in which the hero seems impervious to bodily harm, regardless of the circumstances. Highsmith and Danson, surely, will land on their feet, like cats with nine lives, no matter what they do.

On another level, "The Other Guys" has a subtextual level that rises(the very instant when both cops jump and have no place to land) and intertwines itself with the surface of the official narrative, in which the fall then transforms itself into a lovers' leap, so the tragedy of closeted ladies' men who live up to the "Shaft" myth stealthily exists alongside the parodic intent to lampoon the hyper-masculinity of heterosexual men with guns.

On the other hand, the other guys, in particular, Allen(Will Ferrell), is straight, even though he pushes paper and carries around a wooden gun. When his partner Terry(Mark Wahlberg) doubts his heterosexuality, Allen pistol-whips him on the nose.