We all have those movies that we like to still quote, even decades after we last saw them. One of those movies for me is 1987’s Dragnet starring Tom Hanks and Dan Aykroyd. I hadn’t seen it in at least 25 years when I noticed that it hit the Netflix schedule in September. I was excited. Here was a good chance to relive the movie that might not have the best reputation, but that I’ve always loved. Or at least, I thought I loved it. After rewatching it with my Netflix subscription, I get why people trash it. I don’t even like it much anymore. Let’s get into it.
There Are Still Some Great Moments
I’m a huge fan of Tom Hanks movies from the early and mid-’80s, like Bachelor Party, The Money Pit, and Splash. I like that goofy, over-the-top comedic Hanks that we haven’t gotten much of since he started winning Oscars and became America’s Dad. It’s not that I don’t like movies like Philadelphia and Saving Private Ryan; I love those too, but I miss that wilder version of Hanks in those early movies. Dragnet is one of those movies from the end of that early run. Big came out in 1988, and that was the inflection point in his career.
And Hanks is funny in it. My opinion on that hasn’t changed. He doesn’t have much to work with, but he manages to deliver enough dry wit to get me giggling. Honestly, Aykroyd is also pretty good as the straight man to Hanks’ cut-up. The idea of Dragnet is still a funny premise, too. As someone old enough to have watched reruns of the original TV show it was based on, I knew the vibe, and it was (and still is) ripe for parody. At times, it really works. At other times, though, it falls apart.
Without Aykroyd And Hanks, There’s Very Little Here
I can’t point to one specific thing about the movie that I really hate or anything, but the movie isn’t funny to me anymore. Outside of a few moments, Dragnet is a serious slog. It’s not the plot, which is fine. It’s not the characters, which I think work. It’s just a slog. There are long periods where it’s just not funny. There also aren’t any characters outside of Aykroyd and Hanks who are funny at all. Dabney Coleman’s character is especially cringy. I was rolling my eyes more than I was laughing.
I think this is reflected in the remarkably average rating on Rotten Tomatoes, where it hovers right at the 50% mark. That’s a failing grade, to be sure, but it’s not, like, totally worthless. This isn’t Battleship Earth. It’s not one of the best comedies of the ‘80s, either. It’s not even close to one of the best comedies of 1987, even. That's a year that included The Princess Bride, Raising Arizona, Beverly Hills Cop II, and Adventures in Babysitting, among many others. Not to mention, Dragnet was released the same day as Spaceballs, so it wasn’t even the best comedy of its opening weekend.
I’ll still quote the lines I love (“As mohawks go, it's not that bad”), but I don’t think I’ll ever rewatch the whole movie again.
