The Other Guys

Another "misfit-cop-duo-becoming-the-perfect-cop-duo-in-spite-of-or-thanks-to-the-differences-film".
This time it's not the black and the white cop, the black and the Asian cop but the cowardly-prefering-paper-work-cop (Allen Gamble/Will Ferrell) vs the more-courageous-prefering-action cop (Terry Hoitz/Mark Wahlberg).

Within the precinct, among their colleagues, we also find two extremely cocky detectives, namely Chris Danson (Dwayne Johnson) and P.K. Highsmith (Samuel L. Jackson), who everyone idolizes, everyone except Terry and this in spite of the fact that their methods are very costly for the town and the police force (they have a tendency to destroy more than they build up).
However, Danson and Highsmith dies when trying to jump from a twenty-storey building aiming at bushes that doesn't exist(!) and after this everyone wonders who will become the next "super cops".
Allen and Terry are investigating a scaffoldring permit violation by a multi-billionaire when they uncover a much bigger criminal plot including hired mercenaries and it gets more complicated as our two heroes initially are unable to decide who the real "bad guys" are.
During their investigation, leading them deaper into the criminal world of "big shots", they confide things about themselves to one another that changes their view on themselves and also changes the way they work.
Their investigation gets more and more complicated and the consequences of what they have found are more wide-ranging than they ever could have expected.
In the end - after almost having been killed - they gain the respect, the women and half the kingdom.
The film ends with references to different licit and illicit financial operations leading up to the financial crisis we've all - more or less - been living under the last three years.

In its ambition to display the cruel and psychopathic financial market, they do not succeed in displaying it as ugly as it really is. In this case it more becomes a slapstick-comment and as such it has its advantages but...
On the other hand one can't really see this film neither as a serious debate contribution in a comic outfit, nor as a pure comedy. That is to say, it halts.
Will Ferrell is the one person displaying that he better than the others, master the comedy genre, in spite of not using a more 'vulgar humour' but a rather laid back and cool approach to his character.
Wahlberg is an actor a bit to stiff for this genre and that might be a result of the fact that one are used to see him in action roles but he doesn't really match up to Ferrell as his partner.
Johnson and Jackson perform their "tough guys with a bad attitude"-roles and as such they do what one can expect of them.

We get to see a peacock in the film, maybe as a symbol for gaudiness and excessiveness but also for renewal and immortality?
We were not to impressed by this film and there are many other police films portraying the police work in a much more entertaining way - except for "Police Academy", perhaps.

(Photo poster copied from: http://www.comingsoon.net/gallery/53244/The_Other_Guys_12.jpg)

(Photo Samuel L. Jackson and Dwayne Johnson copied from: http://cdn.screenrant.com/wp-content/uploads/Samuel-L.-Jackson-Dwayne-Johnson-The-Other-Guys.jpg)