Deep Cover: fun, but not that deep

Deep Cover is a fun and action-filled British comedy with an unlikely premise: what would happen if a trio of improv actors are flung into an underworld of drug-smuggling, dirty cops, and dead bodies that need burying? The result is that though these characters don’t do well in their regular lives, they are surprisingly successful—by accident— in the crime world. 

Main character Kat (Bryce Dallas Howard) longs to perform her one-woman comedy show, but  gives improv lessons instead. One of her most intense students, Marlon (Orlando Bloom) is an actor who only lands roles like a knight in a pizza commercial. The third member of the trio, Hugh (Nick Mohammed) is an awkward and downtrodden IT specialist. 

Kat gets hired by a Met detective to do a sting operation—buying contraband cigarettes—and  brings along her two students to practice their acting. The situation escalates and suddenly the three improvisers get snared in the web of Fly, a coke dealer. Sent to shake down a man for money, the trio sees their first dead body when the man, running away, gets struck by a car (but this won’t be their last corpse!). Meanwhile, Kat’s bougie friends worry about her as she keeps meeting them at inconvenient moments. 

There are few women in this movie, but they are allowed to be badasses. Kat, considered the brains of the improv trio, is also gutsy, staying in character and never getting flustered. Unlike most women in action-type movies, she stays focused on her career and is given zero romantic entanglements. Another female role is Shosh (Sonoya Mizuno), Fly’s assistant. Shosh sports a button-down white shirt with a man’s tie and is handy with weapons. Though Shosh becomes a love interest for Hugh, she sets the terms of the relationship, not him (Shosh shows appreciation for a polite man by throwing him onto a bed.)

The cadre of White men representing law and order, the police force, are portrayed as self-important, incompetent, or corrupt. The detective who originally hired Kat double crosses her, and a new recruit admits he got his job through nepotism. Though Black people are only represented in the crime world, the gangsters seem more honorable than the cops; K-Lash, a fierce machete-wielding gang leader, is good at her job and deserves the respect she’s given. 

Hugh, described in the film as East Asian, is a bit of a stereotype; good at tech but bad at interpersonal relationships. However, Shosh’s Asian background—like her femaleness—seems beside the point. She’s tough and that’s all that matters. 

This film isn’t a deep character study but it’s a good time and often genuinely funny. The more biting satire is reserved for those on top of the power structure, such as the police, while those occupying lower levels are given more nuance and likability, even if they operate on the wrong side of the law. This principle gives Deep Cover its heart.