The only truly lethal weapons in the criminally unfunny action comedy “Let’s Be Cops’’ are the lame script, putrid direction and pair of sitcom stars mugging nonstop in frantic pursuit of laughs that have fled over the state line.
“New Girl” costars Jake Johnson and Damon Wayans Jr. play a couple of 30-year-old nitwits who discover strangers respond to their LA cop masquerade costumes, so they decide to play cops for fun.
Johnson’s character is an unemployed actor and former football star for Purdue University — which ought to sue for defamation — while Wayans plays a video game designer.
Somehow their highly inexpert ruse fools even a veteran police officer (Rob Riggle), who becomes their ally.
Johnson, the more gung-ho of the two, gets so into his masquerade that he even buys an LAPD cruiser on eBay to impress the ladies (though how he pays for it is never explained).
Unfortunately, the guys also attract the attention of a generically European mobster (James D’Arcy) who’s in league with a corrupt police detective (Andy Garcia, who must really need the money).
This is the throw-it-at-the-wall-and-see-what-sticks school of comedy. Unfortunately, nothing sticks during the way-too-long running time, which is punctuated by tired drug gags, periodic gun battles to keep the audience awake — and that charmingly homophobic testicles-in-the-face routine.
Even when the writers somehow stumble into a promising situation — a shoot-out in the conference room of Wayans’ video-game employer — director Luke Greenfield (whose rap sheet includes “The Animal’’) has no idea of how to stage it to actually get laughs.
Small wonder “Let’s Be Cops’’ was hidden from critics before it opened Wednesday. What it really required was a 10- to 20-year stretch in witless protection.