This Obnoxoius Review of 'Ride Along' Is Almost as Annoying as the Movie

By Dustin Rowles | Film | January 17, 2014 |

By Dustin Rowles | Film | January 17, 2014 |

Ride Along stars Ice Cube, who has two faces — a scowl, and a huge soft-hearted grin, and nothing in between — and Kevin Hart, who has a habit of repeating everything he says twice, once in a slightly annoying voice, and a second time, IN A LOUDER, MORE ANNOYING VOICE. Hart plays Ben Barber, a mall security guard with his heart set on marrying his girlfriend Angela (Tika Sumpter) and joining the police force. Standing in his way is the scowl of Angela’s brother, James (Ice Cube), a detective in the Atlanta police force who doesn’t trust Ben because Ben is annoying and speaks very loudly, and also because BEN JUST YELLS ALL OF HIS DIALOGUE IN AN ANNOYING VOICE.

In order to gain James’ blessing, Ben agrees to a ride along for a day, so that he can prove himself worthy of Angela. Over the course of the ride along, Ben mistakes a woman with a beard for a man, AND HOW WAS HE SUPPOSED TO KNOW THAT SHE WAS A WOMAN, SHE’S GOT A BEARD, and gets made fun of by kids, and WHY DON’T THOSE KIDS RESPECT HIM, and pranked by James, WHO KEEPS PRANKING BEN because he’s trying to scare him both away from his sister and out of trying to be a police officer because Ben is not good enough for Angela, AND HE’S NOT WORTHY OF JAMES’ SISTER, who is hot by the way and BLAM. KAPOW. TONGUE WAG. PENIS JOKE.

However, thanks to his boss video game skills, HE’S A PLATINUM VIDEO GAME PLAYER, Ben collects a couple of clues on a case that James is working on, and ultimately gets embroiled in an arms deal, which brings them to the shootout, after which THERE’S ANOTHER SHOOTOUT, which is not a repetition of this annoying review device but actually a statement of fact because Ride Along is the Speed of SHITTY ACTION MOVIES THAT THROW IN EXTRA ACTION SEQUENCES NOT TO IMPROVE THE MOVIE BUT TO PAD THE RUNTIME.

The double climax then brings Ride Along to the gag reel, where, Kevin Hart FLUBS HIS LINES and Ice Cube’s scowl turns into a grin because he can’t maintain his composure, although the only difference between the scenes in the gag reel and the scenes in the actual movie is that ICE CUBE CRACKS UP IN THE GAG REEL.

There is nothing remotely entertaining in Ride Along, and though I do like Kevin Hart in small, supporting roles, AN HOUR AND FORTY MINUTES OF LISTENING TO HART GAB AND GAB WITHOUT ACTUALLY SAYING ANYTHING OF SUBSTANCE quickly grows weary. There’s probably a couple of decent laughs in Ride Along, but I couldn’t hear them over the sound of Kevin Hart’s voice, BECAUSE KEVIN HART’S VOICE IS REALLY LOUD, DO YOU HEAR ME? DO YOU UNDERSTAND ME? BECAUSE THAT’S WHAT I’M SAYING. HIS VOICE IS SHRILL AND NONSTOP AND HE ONLY TAKES A BREAK FROM SHOUTING for other people to make jokes about how short he is, BECAUSE KEVIN HART IS A REALLY SMALL GUY.

My recommendation is to that you not see Ride Along because YOU SHOULD NOT SEE IT because repeating the same statements with slightly different wording AND IN A LOUDER VOICE does not make the statement funny NOR DOES IT MAKE IT HUMOROUS.