Ride Along (2014)

Riding Along, against your will

Fast-talking security guard Ben joins his cop brother-in-law James on a 24-hour patrol of Atlanta in order to prove himself worthy of marrying Angela, James' sister.


No matter what trends come and go in cinema, it seems the buddy cop genre is one which will always be around to give us the predictable storytelling we're accustomed to, and Tim Story makes no attempts to divert from this formula.

From the angry captain to a certain twist, the film is a slave to predictable plotting thanks to Story's unwillingness to take risks. Therefore, the film has to rely on moments which you will have seen done already in better films and a combination of Kevin Hart acting loud mouthed and references to, among other things, a past Ice Cube hit to fill the humor quota.

Relax Kevin, you're not in A Haunted House 2

Ice Cube has proven himself to be a good comedic actor in 21 Jump Street, perfectly embodying the typical angry police captain role, but uses nothing he learnt there, coming off as bored and going through the motions. Kevin Hart walks a fine line throughout the film. In one scene, he could provide the comedic relief, and temporarily liven things up, but come the next scene, would have easily switched to an annoyance, with his loud mouthed shtick getting tired pretty quickly.

Angela, James' sister and Ben's girlfriend, is little more than a plot device, existing just to set up the films plot and to pop-up in order to give the main duo a reason to move to where the next scene takes place. Omar, the main villain, is said to have killed anybody who sees him, so the film attempts to keep the identity of who plays him a secret. It's just a shame that the surprise is spoiled by the actors name appearing in the credits. But it doesn't really matter, because the actor gives an unremarkable performance, merely chewing the scenery.

Ride Along is little more than a copy and paste job that follows the typical buddy-cop formula that'll have you wishing you rewatched Training Day when the eventual reference to it comes around.