Be it a plucky rookie paired with a grizzled veteran or a wild card misfit working alongside a by the book professional the buddy cop movie is an instantly recognisable and beloved trope of action cinema.  Usually, each film can be summed up as being a story of two mismatched cops who must put aside their differences to stop the bad guy and save the day.  It is the simplicity of this tried and tested formula that has made it an enduring success.

A staple of 80’s action cinema, the roots of the buddy cop movie can be found in Akira Kurosawa’s, Stray Dogs (1949) and Norman Jewison’s, In the Heat of the Night (1967).  However, the genre became popularised in Walter Hill’s action/comedy, 48 Hours (1982) before reaching its peak in 1987 with the release of Richard Donner’s classic, Lethal Weapon.  This explosion in popularity lead to a myriad of imitations and knock offs but one such film that often gets overlooked and is a real gem of the genre is Tango and Cash.

Centring on the top two cops in LA, Ray Tango (played by Sylvester Stallone) and Gabriel Cash (played by Kurt Russell) are framed for murder by LA’s top drug lord, Yves Perret (played by Jack Palance).  Locked up with no chance of freedom the pair have to work together to find a way to escape, stop the bad guy and save the day.  Sound familiar?

A suave and sophisticated professional who likes to play the stock market when he isn’t busy fighting crime, we are first introduced to Ray Tango as he is in pursuit of an eighteen-wheeler suspected of transporting drugs. In the subsequent standoff with the truck (lifted from Jackie Chan’s Police Story) Tango’s nerve holds and he gets his man summing up everything we need to know about him as a character.

‘Rambo is a Pussy!’

If Airplane is famous for having a joke a minute then Tango and Cash has a similar claim to fame in terms of quips and one-liners.  During the arrest in the opening sequence, Stallone presents a pair of handcuffs to the criminals saying, “Do you like jewellery?”  It is from this point on that the one-liners start and they do not relent until the end credits roll.  Later in the same scene, Stallone gives a wink to the audience when he declares that “Rambo is a pussy” when being compared to him by another cop establishing the wry tone of the film.

Of course, there can be no Tango without Cash and we are first introduced to him as he arrives home at his sloppy apartment.  With his shaggy hair and a cocky stride, it is hard to see how anyone other than Kurt Russell could have played the role but this was almost not the case. Originally Patrick Swayze was the first choice for the role but he chose to tear out bad guy’s throats with his bare hands in Road House instead.

Cash’s rough and tumble approach to police work is perfectly summed up in his opening scene as he chases down a would-be assassin. Jumping through windows leading to a fun car chase in an underground car park that is one cliche after another complete with a lot of damage to public property.  In response to totalling a commandeered vehicle from an immigrant, Cash smirks saying, “Welcome to America”. Although they differ in their methods, Tango and Cash are really two sides of the same coin.

Outside The Headliners, There’s Solid Support From Some Well-Known Faces. 

As lead villains go Jack Palance is on top scene chewing form as Yves Perret, residing in a secret lair that would make Blofeld blush ( Perret’s plush pad of villainy lies hidden in the middle of a quarry). It is here that he hatches his plan to get rid of Tango and Cash once and for all, complete with practical experiments involving rats in a maze. Palance takes all of this on board and injects it into his performance by tuning everything up to 11.

Although his right-hand men played by Marc Alaimo and James Hong are criminally underused, it is Brion James who stands out as Perret’s muscle.  In what was originally a small role with little to no lines, James decided to make the most of what he was given in order to stand out and boy did he ever? Sporting a cockney accent that would make Dick Van Dyke proud James’ accent stood out so much so that Stallone loved it and made sure that his character was fleshed by giving him more lines and scenes.

In the only female role of note in the film, Teri Hatcher plays Tango’s sister Katherine. Her part in the film serves only to cause further division between Tango and Cash as Tango’s overprotective side is in overdrive in the presence of an overzealous Cash. She also highlights a few of the film’s problems. 

Although a product of 80’s action cinema it does highlight how poorly written female characters were in comparison to today.

‘The Worst-Organised, Most Poorly Prepared Film Ever’

Behind the scenes, underwritten characters were the least of the film’s problems.  From the script to the cinematography and even the editing suffered from having people constantly being fired and hired. Some of the crew described it as being “…the worst-organised, most poorly prepared film” that they’ve been involved with. 

A combination of Stallone’s ego and studio interference left the film with a total of four directors. Although Andrey Konchalovskiy gets the credit for the job, it has been reported that he was out of his depth during the shoot with the film’s budget spiralling out of control. His insistence on adopting a serious tone to the film lead to his departure during the film’s edit.

The erratic nature of the film can be summed up in the film’s climactic action sequence at Perret’s quarry lair. With Tango’s sister kidnapped, the titular dynamic duo armed with the “RV from hell” burst onto the scene to save the day in a symphony of destruction featuring rocket launchers, scores of dead henchmen and an inexplicable monster truck.  None of it really makes sense but I’ll be damned if it isn’t entertaining.

Objectively there is no denying that Tango and Cash isn’t a good film.  The script problems stick out like a sore thumb with some problematic scenes that have aged terribly.  Having said that, the charisma and chemistry between Sylvester Stallone and Kurt Russell are what has allowed the film to endure. 

What makes it stand out in its genre is how it just about avoids being an absolute parody. The unashamed drive to make the film pure unadulterated fun is what makes it rise above all of its problems. If you’re willing to switch your mind (and sense of logic) off for two hours and embrace the film for what is then you can have a lot of fun with Tango and Cash. 

For my money, it is the ultimate buddy cop guilty pleasure.