ALMOST COPS/ BAD BROS

Holland, 2025, 93 minutes, Colour.

Jandinao Asporaat, Werner Kolf, Florence Vos Weeda.

Directed by Gonzalo Fernandez Carmona.

The Dutch title indicates that this is very much to be linked with the American franchise, with Will Smith and Martin, Bad Boys. In fact, early in the film the central character shouts enthusiastically, Bad Boys for Life!

While Dutch audiences may take the characters and settings for granted, the race mixture for this comedy drama, set in Holland, in the city of Rotterdam, offers something of a cultural surprise. The internationality of the cast is important, migrant families from the Dutch colonies in South America, the central character born in Antilles (hence the Dutch connection), some of the characters with Arab backgrounds, highlighting the recent decades of migrant and refugee movements into Europe (and, with some Dutch politicians, attempts at strong and harsh political backlash).

At the centre of this story is a very nice character Ramon (Jandino Asporaat), not a policeman but with the job for maintaining social order in the city. His father was a policeman killed in action (with flashbacks) and he imagines himself, for instance, controlling bank robbers and actually talking to them and offering them some kind of friendship and support. Then he wakes up. He is involved in all kinds of petty infringements of legislation, an old woman refusing to pick up her dog’s faeces, people riding bikes in parks where it is forbidden…

He is also interested in setting up a centre for the young disaffected of the city, his half brother, Kevin, offering to help, supplying a pool table. Then the film shows Kevin at work, surveillance at a wharf, children coming in and stealing what they say they thought was sand but which is cocaine, then the criminals coming back and Kevin being killed. To the dismay of his partner, tough guy, Jack.

Then the film changes tone somewhat. Ramon many times looks very much like Kevin Hart, in the genial and naive aspects. But, with Jack now as his partner, and the tough attitudes to those infringing the law – chaining them, pepper spray… And long chases, and Ramon learning of his brother’s death, the film turns very much into a kind of Dutch parody/imitation/ homage to Bad Boys.

And, in many ways it becomes much sillier, very much the Kevin Hart comedy style though Jack is more in the Idris Elba tradition rather than Will Smith. The situations, even the dangers, are generally played for laughs and some very eccentric situations. But, ultimately, discovering a drug war amongst the gangs in Rotterdam, a confrontation, and Ramon and Jack winning the day.

With the range of characters and the inner-city action, the screenplay could be transferred instantly to an American setting and remake. But, much more care was taken and thought given to the original Bad Boy films.