When I was a kid, there was a time when an Eddie Murphy comedy was an event to be both anticipated and appreciated. But the legend’s record on streaming movies is mixed, and “The Pickup” which comes out this week on Amazon Prime Video keeps that inconsistency going.

Indeed, we get Murphy as Russell Pierce, a tenured but tired armored truck guard, who gets paired with a younger and reckless driver in Pete Davidson’s Travis Stolly. Together, they get involved in a heist led by the charasmatic Zoe (Keke Palmer) on Russell’s 25 wedding anniversary.

The problem here is Pete Davidson, someone the film industry believes can still be funny. Murphy is feeding him the banter comedy we’ve loved for decades and he can’t return the serve because he only knows how to be Pete Davidson. And that can’t carry a movie like this. There is also a lot of filler even though the movie is only an hour and a half. We never truly care about any of these characters, which discounts the decent action scenes. Murphy can’t fly with these things holding him back and that’s another thing we should know by now.

What does work here is Keke Palmer, who gives the best performance in the movie. She balances the comedy and action very nicely, and she has no problems keeping up with Murphy. There are other faces that are fun to see here like WWE star Roman Reigns and NFL great Marshawn Lynch. And for the second time in as many weeks, we get Eva Longoria in clean up mode on a Prime Video movie. I know there must have been some serious dollar signs involved but she needs to get back to starring roles soon.

When its all done, we unfortunately get another forgettable Eddie Murphy streaming movie with another annoying performance by Pete Davidson. At least Palmer can be proud of her contribution here.

The Pickup

Grade: C-