Off Beat

Happy-go-lucky Joe Gower (Judge Reinhold) is a rollerskating New York City librarian. His idiocy causes trouble for his policeman best friend Abe Washington (Cleavant Derricks). Abe is forced to tryout for a police charity performance as punishment. He sends in Gower to impersonate him. Instead of quickly failing out of the tryout, Gower falls for policewoman Rachel Wareham (Meg Tilly) and joins the charity troupe. Also joining the group is Rachel's angry ex Pete Peterson (Joe Mantegna). Gower impersonating a police officer eventually causes problems.

This is trying to be wacky funny but there is a disconnect with the subject matter. It sucks the comedy right out of the movie. First, Gower is a bit annoying. If he's a girl, Gower could play it off as a dumb blonde. The first scene is his idiocy allowing a criminal to escape. It's a little quirky but really bad if you think about it. Then there is the impersonating police. That's not a good thing. It doesn't help that he's so nonchalant about it. It's really infuriating. I usually like Judge but not here. Why is he wearing the uniform in public? Why would Abe continue to allow him to borrow his uniform? Every time he dismisses Abe's concern is like a knife jabbing in my ear. Wouldn't other cops notice that he doesn't have a gun? Him buying a gun does not help. I expected the idiot to shoot himself or worst someone else. How do you convict a car thief with only an anonymous note? This is not a movie fit for thinking deeply. The more I think about it, the less I like this.

Judge Reinhold stars as librarian Joe Gower, who owes his cop pal Abe (Cleavant Derricks) a favour after unwittingly blowing an undercover drugs bust. So when Abe is chosen by his boss to take part in a police charity dance show, he gets Joe to take his place; at first Joe is reluctant to take part, but eventually he learns to loosen up and enjoy himself, especially after falling for pretty dance partner, hostage negotiator Rachel Wareham (Meg Tilly).

A gentle, PG-rated rom-com starring a prancing Judge Reinhold finds its way into my DVD 'to watch' pile, causing me to momentarily slip into Austin Powers mode (That's not mine! I'm telling you baby, that's not mine. This sort of thing ain't my bag, baby!). Then I remember: I was given the DVD as part of a freebie job lot by a work colleague, who was moving to the States, so I feel a little bit better about myself.

I watch the film so that I can add it to my pile of films destined for the local charity shop, and am surprised to find that it isn't all that bad. Not great, mind you, and not a 'keeper' (it's still going down the charro), but pleasant enough for a one-time viewing. Don't expect any outrageous, off the wall comedy (as the blurb on the cover promises)—there isn't any (unless the sight of Reinhold in Lycra counts). Do expect some mildly amusing silliness, a spot of heartwarming romance, and lots of familiar faces (the supporting cast including Joe Mantegna, Harvey Keitel, Fred Gwynne, John Turturro, and magician Penn Jillette).

5.5/10, rounded up to 6 for IMDb.

Librarian assistant Joe Gower takes up the offer to help out his friend Abe by posing as a cop to take his place in a police dance performance, but he finds himself falling for female officer Rachel. Therefore he digs himself deeper when he starts acting like his a cop outside of the dance training to impress this lady. "Off Beat" is a pleasurably breezy, light-hearted 80s romantic comedy with plenty of familiar faces on show. The cast are indeed great, with Judge Reinhold and Meg Tilly in the leads. For me, the adorable Tilly is always a delight to watch, but she still can pack a punch. James Tolken sure finds out. A tolerable Reinhold is gawky, but likable as Gower. Loved the scenes he shares with the wise-cracking Cleavant Derricks, who plays his friend Abe. The sequence with them arguing in a change room and Derricks' final word to the shop assistant is priceless. Most of the lively support roles with character actors are spot-on and do over-shadow the leads. Harvey Keitel and Victor Argo might only have small roles towards the end, but their chemistry together was hilarious with Argo truly stealing the show. Austin Pendleton as a gun shop salesman is quite humorous too. Rocket launcher for home protection?! Joe Mantegna is a true live-wire as fellow-cop / ex-boyfriend of Tilly's character. Also dependably showing up is Mike Starr, Amy Wright, John Turturro, Penn Jillette, John Kapelos, Anthony Zerbe and Fred Gwynne. But the list still goes on. Quite a macho lot, where the script seems to sarcastically tear apart at this bravado and the dialogues are fun in nailing it. Even questioning one's own comfort, by taking a chance outside that familiar zone. Its bubblegum soundtrack gives it much added bounce. Commonplace, but endearing comedy.

"I won't hurt them. I'll kill them. "

Joe Gower (Judge Reinhold) is a likable librarian who's currently in a bit of a slump with his girlfriend having left him and being passed over once again for promotion. Joe's best friend Officer Abe Washington (Cleavant Derricks) is assigned to a dance program for charity that will be done entirely with police officers, and not wanting to deal with it calls in a favor from Joe to take his place after Joe inadvertently blew a sting operation. Joe takes on the persona of "A. Washington" and meets another cop, Rachel Wareham with whom he falls in love.

Off Beat was one of three comedies Judge Reinhold released in 1986 alongside comedy classic Ruthless People and other comedy Head Office with both Head Office and Off Beat going mostly ignored at the box office. Written by Mark Medoff, better known for more serious minded content like Children of a Lesser God, the movie was marketed as a more zany madcap hijinx comedy in line with films such as Stripes or Police Academy when it was a much more lowkey character based comedy with a romance element. The movie did get solid responses back in the day including from Roger Ebert who declared it one of the year's best comedies, but other reception seemed to have been colder and the film failed to recoup its $10 million budget petering out at $4 million. Off Beat is one of the more obscure films in Reinhold's filmography and has been mostly neglected from further home video releases or releases on digital storefronts and that's a shame because while Off Beat isn't perfect, it's a likable film with solid leads that's quite enjoyable.

Reinhold is undeniably what makes this movie. With his likable good natured simplicity he's really the perfect fit for this lovable underdog and the sequences of him dancing alongside harder edged cops Such as Joe Mantegna who make their disdain for dancing quite clear. Meg Tilly makes a nice counterpart to Reinhold and the two have believable chemistry that helps sell the core romance in the film. The movie also has a nice set of supporting actors including an early turn by John Turtoro as Reninhold's rival Pepper, Penn Jillette has fun playing Reinhold's Travis Bickle esque co-worker Norman who spouts nonsensical tirades about mailing explosives to TV stations for cancelling Family Feud of all things, and even Harvey Keitel makes an appearance as one of a pair of robbers in the climax that are played almost how you'd expect in a serious crime thriller making them a welcome point of comic contrast to the farcical nature of the material. Not every bit works as Mantegna's character feels like he's setup to be more important than he actually ends up being and some of the material surrounding Cleavant Derricks' Abe Washington character doesn't hold much water even when accounting for "comedic logic", but the movie is so likable and good natured I find it easy to recommend.

Off Beat has been unfairly forgotten and the fact that it's not available on digital storefront or current home media is disappointing. I've seen other failed comedy films from around this time that are disgustingly easy to get access to (Hot to Trot and First Family certainly come to mind) but this movie despite not being a comedy classic really should've been given more of a chance. It's not a laugh riot by any stretch, but it's a nice little movie with likable characters and a solid enough execution of a high concept.

I've just seen this movie, and no offence, but it was a major letdown. I remember this drive in movie playing at the time when Judge Reinhold was well makin' a name for himself in the mid 80/late 80 phase. Why the reason, for seeing it now? A relation of mine, gave me a few bags of VHS'S and this time, like last, I picked out more a minority. I only got a few laughs, mainly in the early part, the cop chase, quite funny, a highpoint, but annoying too. Meg Tilly does look hot here, in dance wear, and her punching out fellow cop, (Top Gun's shouting captain, James Tolkan) was a grand moment. As a favor, for stuffing up an undercover operation, involving his best friend, a cop, run down, unfulfilled librarian, Joey Gower (Reinhold) charades as his buddy, playing the role, where he attends these full cop rehearsals for a stage show, but inadvertently falls in love with Tilly, where complications and that, arise as you can probably guess. The film has a lot of stale scenes, one lengthy scene, I thought was gonna gonna go for the rest of the movie, where Reinhold gets caught in a bank robbery, where actors, Harvey Keitel ans Victor Argo (the robbers) are the comic relief. So many good actors are wasted in this forgettable film, it kind of pi..ed me off, to be honest. This is just one of those eighties, pretty week comedies, where a few actors should of been locked up for their time in this, ninety plus minutes, I could of been doing many other productive things.