"Go Crime!" Clueless Detectives

“Police Academy,” “Lethal Weapon,” and “48 Hours” are just mere examples of many movies that cover cops and their lives.

The Korean movie scene is not an exception. Police stories have always been a popular source for movies such as the three “Two Cops” series in a row, “No Exceptions,” and “Wild Card,” regardless whether they portrayed the police positively or not. So-called “police” movies click on two familiar keywords: crimes and corruption. Laughs and action are created by the two partners.

“Kopps,” a comedy opening on November 5, goes beyond this common imagination of a police movie. A village with a 10-year record of no crimes is a peculiar setting already. The police station in this village is being threatened to close down because of the zero crime rate, and the police officers start a “crime making” scheme to protect their police station. The laughter of the movie begins with the “reversal” of the policemen going out to commit crimes in order to keep their dear working place, the police station, alive.

Even though it is not clearly portrayed, there is actually work for them in this small village where the crime rate is zero percent. The police officers go out with a report, but the only case they get is chasing away cows which are stepping on flower beds. Benny (Torkel Petersson), Jakob (Fares Fares), husband and wife police officer Lasse (Goran Ragnerstam), and Agneta (Sissela Kyle), the police officers, spend their days playing poker with the old people of the village and fixing broken doors.

The place is called a police station, but we would rather call it a police box here in Korea. One day, they greet a sleek beauty from the headquarters, and the next day they received a notice out of the blue from her that their branch is being closed down because of the zero crime rates.

Sweden’s young director Josef Fares, 26, has heightened the level of laughter combining this idea with highly exaggerated characters. Benny’s actions in his own imagination are extravagant that even Neo in the movie “Matrix” will get jealous. Catching bullets with his bare hand, making a bomb out of the bullets that he caught, using the skill called “three cushions” from billiards, shooting a gun using his pants’ zipper are some examples.

Jakob as Benny’s partner and also as a decent police officer goes for blind dates one after another but always fails to get a girlfriend.

If you do not laugh at the “comedy of basic instinct” near the end of the movies, you either dislike comedy in general or are a serious-minded movie watcher.

Fares was born in Lebanon and moved to Sweden when he was 10. He debuted with his movie called “Jalla! Jalla!” (2000) based on his personal experiences. Fares Fares , Josef Fares’ real-life brother, starred as Jakob and their father Jan also has a supporting role in the movie.

Adam Sandler, who is a movie producer as well as a comedian, has bought the remake rights for this movie.

Allowing audiences over 12.

dunanworld@donga.com