Coffee and Kareem is an action comedy directed by Michael Dowse. The plot sees disgraced, demoted police officer James Coffee (Ed Helms), become targeted by a recently escaped gangster as well as a corrupt police force. He goes on the run with his girlfriend’s teenage son Kareem (Terrence Little Gardenhigh): together they must stay alive and bring the guilty to justice.
This is a mess of a film, the tone of the film is family friendly, there is a large empathises placed on the relationship between Coffee and Kareem, however the humour of the film is r rated. The two don’t go together well if anything they clash horribly; it feels weirdly at war with itself.
The humour, or lack thereof, is proof of everything wrong with this film. The humour is not funny in anyway, it is painfully unfunny at best and cringey and awkward at worst. The worst offender here is Taraji P. Henson, she plays Kareem’s mother and Coffee’s girlfriend, her character is a stereotype and every time she is on screen, you’re begging her to just go away, as each line she delivers is worst than the last. The same can be said for Betty Gilpin who plays one of Coffee’s fellow police officers, she is so much more capable than this and deserves better than this.
This film tries at every turn to prove how relevant it is by constantly spouting current world events or politics. The film seems to think that this is funny, but it really isn’t, whenever the film excretes one of these lines it takes you out of the film and makes you cringe; this film will feel incredibly dated in just a few months.
More than anything else this film makes me lose any respect I ever had for Ed Helms. It is clear at this point that he is not even trying anymore, he is just taking lazy role after lazy role just for the money. He has long since stopped being funny and really should stop appearing in comedy films, as his presences indicates a bad film.
Overall, this film is the worst of the worst, it proves everything wrong with the Netflix greenlight process, and personally I think this is a career low for Ed Helms.
Pros.
It isn’t offensive.
Cons.
It is boring.
It tries too hard to be relevant.
It is not funny.
Ed Helms is terrible.
Why was this made?
1/5
Reviewed by Luke
Another Millennial Reviewer 