Rumors of Will Ferrell’s demise have been greatly exaggerated. After falling from his perch atop the comedy world with a trio of high-profile disappointments, Semi Pro, Land of the Lost, and Step Brothers, the venerable funnyman seemed destined to join the tragic ranks of fellow SNL alums Mike Myers and Eddie Murphy, comic geniuses who fell prey to their own spectacular success. But he makes a triumphant return to form in The Other Guys, a riotous action comedy from longtime Ferrell collaborator Adam McKay (Anchorman, Talladega Nights).
Playing Allen Gamble, a straightlaced NYPD detective happily confined to his desk job as a forensic accountant, Ferrell dials down the goofball element that metastasized in recent years, instead exhibiting a kind of earnest cluelessness more reminiscent of his character in Elf. Safely in his element crunching numbers and combing paperwork for accounting irregularities, risk-averse Gamble is more than willing to concede the spotlight to the precinct’s glory-hound celebrity cops, Danson and Highsmith (Dwayne Johnson and Samuel Jackson), who’ve charmed the citizenry with their heroic indifference toward danger, private property, or common sense.
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