Jerry Bruckheimer's fond memories of Detroit are reflected in 'Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F'

The biggest movie franchise with a Motor City tie returns Wednesday when “Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F” arrives on Netflix.

It’s an action-packed, laugh-strewn reunion with Eddie Murphy’s brash, charming Detroit police detective character, who burst onto the scene in 1984. It’s also a love letter of sorts from big-time producer Jerry Bruckheimer to his hometown.

”The story was originally written in another place, but I moved it to Detroit and used the high school I went to as part of Eddie’s backstory,” say Bruckheimer of the original “Beverly Hills Cop,” which made Murphy a huge movie star and launched a run on the Mumford High School T-shirts that his character wore. “It’s fond memories of growing up there. What a wonderful city it was and I’m sure it still is.”

The Hollywood legend has accumulated a list of credits that could take up several chapters in a history of American pop culture. He is known for producing popular favorites like 1980’s “American Gigolo,” 1996’s “The Rock” and 2000’s “Remember the Titans” and cinematic blockbusters like  the “Top Gun,” “Bad Boys,” Pirates of the Caribbean and “National Treasure” franchises. And that’s not even counting his TV output, which include “CSI” and its many spin-offs and the reality competition “The Amazing Race.”  

Even more impressive, he is still flexing his talent for producing enormous crowd pleasers like 2023’s best picture Oscar nominee “Top Gun: Maverick,” a box office behemoth that earned about $1.5 billion globally, and this year’s “Bad Boys for Life,” which has taken in more than $400 million worldwide.

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“Axel F,” the fourth "Beverly Hills Cop" installment in the franchise, brings Murphy’s character back to California’s swanky zip code, but not before starting with an energetic sequence set and partly filmed in Detroit. This time out, Axel Foley returns to the West Coast to help with an investigation that is endangering his estranged daughter (Taylour Paige).

The movie is laced with throwbacks to the first two “Beverly Hills Cops” films, which were produced by Bruckheimer, and reunites Murphy with original cast members Judge Reinhold, John Ashton, Bronson Pinchot and Paul Reiser. But the screenplay gives Murphy new challenges, especially now that he’s playing a middle-aged cop still taking the same outrageous risks of his youth and a flawed dad struggling to reconnect with his now-grown child.

Says Bruckheimer of the dual strategy: “You want to give the audience something from the past that they loved. But they don’t want the same thing. They want a different story. You’ve got to give them something special and different, yet you’ve got to honor the nostalgia from the first two movies that I worked on.”

The movie is dotted with enough Detroit nods, references and visuals to make the Motor City a a supporting character. There are glimpses of essential this-is-Detroit sites like the Renaissance Center, the Joe Louis Fist and several others in the opening sequence, which also features the voice of WJLB-FM's Bushman delivering a "winter weather advisory" on Murphy's car radio.

The footage was shot here in late 2022. Murphy didn't come to Detroit for any filming, but is seamlessly interwoven into the Detroit scenes as a result of skillful editing and convincing sets and locations that double for the D.

The movie also includes songs by Detroit music icons that already are associated with the franchise, namely "The Heat Is On," by Glenn Frey and "Shakedown" by Bob Seger. And Murphy's wardrobe boasts the stylish Detroit Lions jacket seen in previews, a Honolulu blue Lions sweatshirt and WJLB-FM and WLLZ-FM T-shirts.

Even the pre-party for the "Axel F" premiere at the Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts in Beverly Hills was Detroit-themed with touches like coney dogs on the menu, according to reports. One of Detroit's newer stars, Big Sean, performed songs, and guests posed next to a vintage Chevy Nova, the Foley character's trademark automobile.

For Bruckheimer, "Axel F" is the latest venture in a film and TV industry career that stretches back to the 1970s. He was born and raised in Detroit by German immigrant parents whose life lessons about work still resonate with him.  ”My entire family were all hard workers. I think the harder you work, the luckier you get,” he says.

Growing up on the city’s northwest side, Bruckheimer already was a team builder at the age of 10 or so. He has talked about how he uses skills today that he acquired while organizing baseball and hockey teams made up of neighborhood kids.

"It’s all the same. You’ve got to put people together. You’ve got to communicate with them and try to get great people working with you,” he says during a Zoom interview. Then he jokes modestly, “I wasn’t very good with baseball or hockey, but I’ve gotten better through the years with movies.”

The Red Wings get a cameo in “Axel F,” thanks to the opening's hockey game scene. Bruckheimer says it was shot at Little Caesars Arena (but the Red Wings locker room that's depicted is a set filling in for the real thing).

The Detroit Lions still have a place in his heart, too. Earlier in 2024, an online promo for “Axel F” featured Lions quarterback Jared Goff sharing what he’d learned from the Murphy character for his move from the Los Angeles Rams to Detroit.

Is Bruckheimer rooting for the Lions to reach the Super Bowl next season? “Absolutely," he says. "I’m still a big Lions fan and cheer them on every week. I haven’t deserted the Lions or the Red Wings.”

Movies fueled the famed producer's childhood imagination. He says his mother used to drive him to the Mercury Theater at Schaefer and Six Mile and drop him off to see matinees. He was influenced by epics he saw at the now-demolished site and elsewhere, particularly sweeping classics like “Bridge on the River Kwai,” “Lawrence of Arabia” and “The Great Escape.”

Although the Metro Times recently selected him as the most famous graduate of Mumford High (where he was in the class of 1961), Bruckheimer says that he wasn’t voted most likely to succeed. “Not at all. I was quite the opposite. I was the least likely to succeed,” he recounts. “I wasn’t a great student, but somehow I got out of there and got accepted to a college and just kind of  worked my way to New York and then to Hollywood.”

After graduating from the University of Arizona, Bruckheimer worked at what was then McManus, John & Adams, the Detroit advertising agency that had the Pontiac account. He confirms one of his early commercials was for the Pontiac GTO, a  muscle car that was too expensive for him to own at the time.

“I had a LeMans, a Pontiac LeMans, but in those days, I couldn’t quite afford a GTO. I had a used Lemans, a red convertible, beautiful.”

Bruckheimer says that he loved being in advertising, but he was drawn to the world of cinema. “I knew I loved movies and the closer I could get to making movies was what I wanted to do. ... But you’re always looking for the next challenge. I’m still sitting here looking for the next one.”

Whether it's  “Axel F” or a title from another of his franchises, Bruckheimer says the inner compass that guides his choices is “pretty simple.” According to him: “I just want to make movies I want to see. I don’t know what you like. I don’t know what the audience likes. But I know what I like. Fortunately for me, the things I’ve liked other people have liked.”

It’s really all about entertaining an audience, he stresses. “I love to stand back in the theater after we’ve finished a movie and watch an audience enjoy what we do. And that’s the greatest thrill that I can have because you’re making people feel better for a couple of hours. … That’s what it’s all about.”

Contact Detroit Free Press pop culture critic Julie Hinds at jhinds@freepress.com.

'Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F'

Rated R; language, violence, drug use

1 hour, 55 minutes

Arrives Wednesday on Netflix