Two straight-laced guys infiltrate a street gang to rescue their kidnapped kitten. It’s a funny concept, and when you add in the undeniably hilarious duo of Jordan Peele and Keegan-Michael Key, there’s a recipe for a killer comedy. As a five-minute sketch, “Keanu” would be amazing. As a 98-minute film? Not so much.
Directed by Peter Atencio and co-written by Peele and Alex Rubens, the movie mines a lot of the same material that made “Key & Peele” a successful show. Clarence (Key) and Rell (Peele) are cousins in L.A. who wear pastel polos and listen to George Michael. “You sound like Richard Pryor doing an impression of a white guy,” Rell jokes. “You sound like John Ritter all the time,” Clarence retorts. Titular kitty aside, the movie is actually about identity and how it changes depending on where we are and who we’re with. Once the cousins get in with the 17th Street Blips (who got kicked out of the Bloods and the Crips), their voices go down an octave and they start dropping a lot of words that aren’t fit to print.
There’s a lot that works in “Keanu.” Key and Peele’s chemistry is off the charts, and the first half-hour of the movie capitalizes on it. Their banter is quick and effortless, and there’s an especially good scene between Clarence and the gang members in his minivan when he convinces them that George Michael is a black singer as they listen to “Father Figure.”
But jokes that should be kept sharp drag on forever, and eventually the wheels start to come off. The script’s cultural commentary and well-drawn protagonists ground the movie as something thoughtful and real, but the (admittedly adorable) kitten rescue gets increasingly ridiculous until it’s impossible to ignore how preposterous the stakes are.
So much of “Keanu” is enjoyable that it’s hard not to get frustrated by the stretches of time that go by without a laugh or even a coherent plot development. The best scenes please as much as good sketches do, but there needs to be more holding it together. Regrettably, a cute kitten in a do-rag doesn’t get the job done, even when he’s voiced by Keanu Reeves in a drug hallucination.
2 stars (out of four)
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