Ryan Reynolds plays Nick, a dirty cop – except he’s not too sure about stealing the siezedgold after all, and when he tries to back out of selling it his partner shoots him in the head during a bust. Nick is on his way to hell when he’s abrubtly placed in a police interview room, and told he has the option of serving 100 years with the R.I.P.D, rounding up the dead who shouldn’t be wandering the earth. With few options he accepts, and is partnered with Roy played by Jeff Bridges, an old west lawman still resentful that coyotes ate his corpse, who spends most of his time ignoring regulations and flirting with Mary-Louise Parker who plays the police supervisor. Can’t blame him really.
And what follows is a dead buddy cop movie with the duo trying to stop Kevin Bacon from allowing the dead back to earth in droves, and I really enjoyed it.
It turns out this was a box office bomb, to be honest I’d never even heard of it until spotting it on the new releases shelf while shopping. Perhaps the marketing department was asleep, perhaps it reviewed poorly, I’ve really no idea but now that it’s cheaper to see I’d recommend giving it a few hours of your time because there’s a good script, great actors, and some good old fashioned fun.
If you like the idea of Men In Black with spooks, you can’t go wrong.
