The dreaded, infamous 0% on Rotten Tomatoes is a label to be both reviled for and applauded for. It’s as rare as white peacocks or purple carrots. However, the quantity of the viewers should also be titrated when evaluating whether a goose egg is earned or merely a biased sampling. Before writing my defense of Bob Clark’s offbeat action-comedy Loose Cannons, I found nary a positive review for this. This is a hill I must conquer and perish upon alone.

For starters, the opening is strikingly infernal with the red flares and Teutonic voice of the villain piercing through the docks like a phantasmagorical vision. It’s a Hieronymus Bosch painting and that must be purely the intention of Clark who was an acolyte of seedy horror cinema (especially when a disembodied head is dangling from a fishing hook to taunt the circus performers cowering in the shadows).

Secondly, Gene Hackman is a consummate profession who never lounges on autopilot. As Mac Stern, a veteran officer on the vice squad, his quips are acerbic such as when he cites obstreperous lovers under a nonexistent penal code. He also possesses a fastidious edge to his character with his polished, vintage car as a representation of “code in the universe”.

Moreover, Hackman’s reactions to Dan Aykroyd’s paroxysmal, Robin-Williams-stream-of-consciousness episodes are the vicarious sentiments of the audience members (“I’m a cop. I don’t know what the hell he is.”). The immiscible-partner chemistry between Aykroyd and Hackman is trenchantly funny.

In fact, before Aykroyd’s relapse into multiple-personality disorder, Aykroyd’s Ellis Fielding is redolent of his Sergeant Friday from Dragnet as he painstakingly scrutinizes the crime scene down to the most minuscule details such as the knee surgery pin. He is also very affable in the role when he downplays and is trepidatious of the illness.

Akyroyd’s psychogalvanic pop-culture delirium is surprisingly uncanny (specifically his Cowardly Lion). The Dana Carvey-esque flights of mimicry are more infrequent than the abysmal reviews would extrapolate. The schizotypal behavior manifests during the car chases and the prerequisite nightclub brawl. The MacGuffin for the Nazi malefactors is very Promethean- a pornographic film which headlines Adolf Hitler with several males (including the prospective chancellor of Germany) and other historical information.

As long-suffering moviegoers, we should be thankful of several attributes. None of the humor is scatological and a majority of it is amusingly mellow. The twosome don’t needlessly bicker or altercate (e.g. When Mac’s vehicular residence is demolished, Ellis is hospitable to Mac to sojourn in his guest room despite the nocturnal disruptions by Ellis’ id). Maybe it’s a symptom of nostalgia but under today’s microscope, Loose Cannons is a unfairly flayed, reasonably funny, inventively tonic buddy picture.

Before 21 and 22 Jump Street popularized the gimmick of updating dated, melodramatic television shows of yore into self-effacing, comedic ore, 1987 gave us a skewering of the 1950’s police procedural Dragnet. Since the template was relatively novel, I can imagine nostalgic Baby Boomers being apoplectic about their beloved crime drama being “bastardized” into a big-screen spoof.

However, unlike McHale’s Navy and CHIPs, director Tom Mankiewicz isn’t disdainful towards its forefather. In fact, the presence of Harry Morgan (from the original series) as Captain Bill Gannon is an implicit seal of approval for this affectionate, endearingly zany incarnation. He might be the most insolent with the as his eyes rolls whenever Akyroyd is sanctimonious about the detective’s debt to the citizens.

With the monotone, celeriac cadence of an auctioneer, Dan Aykroyd is the heir apparent to his uncle Joe Friday’s obedience to the enforcement in the Robbery Homicide division (“Even in the city of angels, some halos slip.”). He drives 8 miles slower on the highway in order to not splurge the taxpayer’s money. Aykroyd is never less than inspired casting in the role. Perhaps his Asperger’s Syndrome diagnosis aided in his retention of reciting county penal codes.

Ira Newborn’s remixed-rap title sequence almost fetishizes the fascist badge of the law as if this were Dredd A.D. The opening narrator lampoons the cliche that they’ve “changed the names to protect the innocence” by unintentionally revealing the actual names. As for Tom Hanks, while he is the more liberal and rubber-faced of the pair, he garners less laughs than Aykroyd’s deadpan shtick. Of course, this was before Hanks transitioned from the sardonic ne’er-do-well of raunchy comedies to bankable A-lister.

Upon revisiting Dragnet, it has aged remarkably well. In my youth, the movie seemed redundant on a one-joke premise (the manifold Village People disguises of the twosome) and Dabney Coleman’s lispy performance has only ameliorated from a mannered tic to a rib-tickling Looney Tunes cartoon. While Hanks is a glorified second banana (whose sole purpose is caustic asides and scribbling notes), Dragnet is not far afield from the tomfoolery of The Naked Gun.

Dragnet treads on a beam where it could topple into candy-coated irreverence during the P.A.G.A.N. (People Against Goodness and Normalcy) ceremony but this is actually the film’s kamikaze crown jewel. The clues of an anaconda-sized reptile, a missing wedding dress and a virgin all zigzag and converge into a screwball set piece with Hanks and Aykroyd jocosely wrangling the animatronic snake with hallucinogenic drugs.

Unfortunately this should’ve been the film’s climax as it regains an equivalent level of offbeat momentum afterwards. Despite that, Aykroyd singlehandedly gentrifies the movie above the inferior last act. Just the subtly square-jawed sight gag of Aykroyd’s mild consternation over flashing breasts is worthy of giving Dragnet another spin.