the audience applauded

Save your money for something good and enjoyable

i must have seen a different film!!

It's simply great fun, a winsome film and an occasionally over-the-top luxury fantasy that never flags.

Well here we are again and its back to training...again! Yep this fourth time around Lassard calls on his most loyal men to train up a group of civvies for his new programme 'citizens on patrol'. Naturally the resident bad guy (this time its back to Harris) doesn't agree with Lassard's plan so he and Proctor are out to foil their plans, so dastardly.The idea behind this isn't too bad really, its a bit like special volunteer officers which we have here in the UK. So the general concept is sound, the problem is we are back at the academy focusing on training these new civvies and we're seeing all the same stuff all over again!!To cut a long story short, seeing as I've explained what happens in the academy for the last three film reviews, we see every character doing their unique thing all over again. This means more martial arts from motor-mouth Jones, Callahan is in the pool getting her huge tits wet, Tackleberry is on the shooting range (where else), Sweetchuck gets thrown around the place a lot, Hightower is on voice commands and Mahoney is lurking around the stereotypical blonde bit of fluff and dishing out his good deed speeches left right n centre.Everything in this film is virtually a replay on everything we've seen in virtually all of the last three films. The last three got away with it because they were more adult and the idea was still reasonably fresh, no longer does this apply. The whole film is very boring and extremely childish, on top of that nothing makes any sense now, its just bits n pieces thrown together.Mahoney, Tackleberry and Hightower perform a very elaborate prank on the three young guys simply to prove they aren't ready for the real beat. This whole sequence is completely nonsense, as if you would go to all that trouble for nothing, its total filler that isn't even amusing. There is a fight sequence on a docked ship against some ninjas (!), no idea why this happens or how the officers end up at the docks but hey. I honestly feel they stuck this in simply to utilize Nogata who cameos here, also another martial arts sequence for Jones who appears out of nowhere. He just pops up for this fight from literately nowhere.Add to that a vast amount of terribly cartoonish visual gags, pratfalls, blatantly obvious stunt doubles, terrible audio dubbing and pretty much no actual main plot (accept for the civvy training crap). There is a jail break midway through which serves as the big finale, this time its in the air with hot air balloons and old biplanes. Now I admit its all performed well with nice aerial stunts and whatnot but its so completely ludicrous. Why on earth would they chase the bad guys in hot air balloons? surely you'd just call in police choppers?? how the hell does everyone seem to be a dab hand at flying biplanes?? why am I even questioning a Police Academy flick? I might add that Hightower completely disappears for the last half of the film, odd, Bubba must have had better things to do.This film is quite 'famous' I suppose for a few things, firstly its one of Sharon Stone's early films as she was slowly getting more recognised. Secondly there is a young Tony Hawks in the film showing his skateboarding skills and thirdly there is also a young David Spade as one of the civvy recruits.This is easily one of the worst PA films in the franchise simply because they reuse every old trick and story sequence idea all over again. Yes I know most of the PA films do this but like I said up to this point in the franchise its been reasonably fresh. This just feels terribly dull, uninspired and has some of the worst comedy I've seen, you can't even call it slapstick, its just sh*t. Goldthwait as Zed is responsible for some of the worst acting, dialog and sequences in this film, not even Bailey as Harris can save this turd.Just to really hammer home the final nail in the coffin, right at the end out of nowhere, Mahoney and Sharon Stone's character are seen floating off together in a customised Police Academy hot air balloon. No explanation about how or where this special balloon came from, its just there, one final silly sequence to really take you out of the moment (if you were in the moment in the first place that is).3/10

I certainly laughed a bit more than I did with the previous sequels. Once again it's all a bit overcrowded, with characters from the previous 3 outings now being mixed together. Bailey is a welcome return as the antagonist, but he is joined by the sidekick of the last two films' villain. This kind of works, as we get the best of both worlds. On top of this we are also given new characters, everyday citizens wanting to help out. This looks interesting at first, with David Spade and a skateboarding buddy forced into the program, but they are soon lost in the background. An entertaining airborne finale is rather impressive as well. So, with Bailey back, and this being Guttenberg's last, this may be a good stopping point for most viewers that made it this far.

Of the Police Academy movies the worst of the bunch for me is the final movie in the series to star Steve Guttenberg as Mahoney. The jokes are the same, the cast is the same the only difference here is they are training citizens to help fight crime in a neighborhood watch type deal. Mauser is gone, replace once again by Harris and I liked Mauser better as he and Proctor to me worked better. Bobcat is back which is bad, as is most of the jokes in this very forgettable movie. Seriously, other than a plot point or two here and there it is very hard to recall this movie other than I did not care for it except for when Proctor ends up letting a whole slew of criminals escape and we have our typical Police Academy ending. I also remember the end with a hot air balloon and Harris. This one also tries to introduce new characters to the gang one overweight dude and an older lady stands out in my mind and for some reason in the next movie the overweight guy would be a cop which makes no sense.

Having first watched this among a group of teenage friends or any other films related to these series of films would have kept you laughing throughout its length and it certainly did with me but as time wears on through the length of poor reviews often given by the press, then I have to accept and say the same after having watched it alone or with a common sense family individual. In the whole, everybody there seems to be enjoying themselves in this lame slapstick that just drags on through swamp and muck since it was originally launched a couple of years back and Steve Guttenberg quit after this one. Of course, some say the series should have stopped after the second one was received with poor reviews yet it beats one in why it should have continued with silly and unfunny slapstick scenes. Just gave the whole lot of these a miss.