The success of sequels, remakes, and reboots these days is highly dependent on how much they live up to the quality of the original, even if the point might be to attract a new audience entirely unfamiliar with what’s previously been made. The Naked Gun, which started as the short-lived TV series Police Squad! in 1982, has established a legacy all its own, which should serve up ample expectations for many moviegoers. This reviewer, however, doesn’t belong to that group, having never seen any prior piece of the franchise, but judging purely from the 2025 film, it’s clear that it knows what it wants to be and isn’t going to let anything stop it from being as unapologetically absurd as possible for the entirety of its runtime.
From the very first scene, where a young girl wanders into a bank that’s in the middle of being a robbed by an alarmingly large number of hijackers and is soon revealed to be Frank Drebin (Liam Neeson), who somehow masked not only his face but also his adult form, this film establishes its sense and level of humor. One of the robbers opens a safety deposit box with a piece of tech in it labeled “P.L.O.T. Device,” and the jokes just keep going from there as Drebin entangles himself into a case that involves the alluring Beth Davenport (Pamela Anderson), who is mourning the loss of her brother in an alleged suicide she knows can’t be what really happened.
Casting Neeson in the role played by the late Leslie Nielsen is a spectacular choice since the actor has been churning out action films where his characters can take out bad guys pretty much just by looking at them since Taken more than a decade and a half ago. He’s sending up that archetype in a big way here, ripping henchmen’s arms off and hitting them in the face with their dismembered limbs or bouncing gun cartridges off his opponents so that they pop right back into place for him to aim at his next target. It’s mostly just nice to see Neeson having fun, since he’s always so serious and typically seeking vengeance for some lost loved one, which isn’t at all the case here.
Pairing Neeson with Anderson is equally successful, since she’s someone whose career has not gone the way she would have hoped but has managed to come back in a productive and impressive way with last year’s The Last Showgirl. After that dramatic turn, she gets to match Neeson’s comedy, indulging in this script’s humorous spoken misunderstandings and deliberately overplaying the part. They’re an entertaining couple, and the film also features Paul Walter Hauser as Frank’s partner Ed and Danny Huston as the big bad who delights in chewing scenery.
Not all the jokes in this film land, but there are so many of them than even the most unflappable viewer should find themselves chuckling, and maybe even cracking up, at least a few times (the latter happened to me for a solid minute or so at one point). Every opportunity for an easy joke is taken, and logic or coherence is never allowed to stand in the way of the opportunity for comedy. At times – most, even – it borders on being too much, but this film doesn’t even pretend to want to be taken seriously, and so audiences should buckle up and get ready for the ride this film wants to take them on, even if it’s not exactly the brand or bandwidth of humor for everyone.
There are surely references and moments that those familiar with the preexisting films will be able to savor, and, based on the enthusiastic responses of those in the same theater at the film’s press screening, this new iteration doesn’t seem to be a disappointment even for diehard fans. Those paying close attention may still miss some moments – like a handful of hilarious mentions in the end credits crawl – but there’s more than enough for most audiences to have a good time in this 85-minute compilation of comedy moments put together into a pretty fun package.
Movie Rating: 6/10
