Anyone will tell you comedy is a hard thing to get right, and the people who tell you that usually hate this fast and loose improv style (usually with a fair helping of gross-out) that's come to prominence over the last decade thanks to Judd Apatow, Paul Feig and their contemporaries.

But I can really appreciate a group of performers who have a real comic timing and chemistry together – like the three guys from the Horrible Bosses movies – no matter how stupid the plot of the movie.

I think the haters and critics of this kind of thing are looking in the wrong direction. You're not there to see an interesting story or feel for the characters – it's the equivalent of situational stand-up comedy on a screen with other stuff going on in the background.

Of course there are better examples of it than this, but there are enough laughs to keep you watching. Two losers who are ready to give up on trying to make it in LA (Jake Johnson, suddenly far more recognisable after Jurassic World and Damon Wayans Jr, the most whitebread black man you've ever seen) and right before they do they attend a masquerade party that they think is a fancy dress party dressed as LAPD.

Walking down the street later mired in misery, they start to find the uniforms attract all kinds of things from respect to attention from girls, and for a lark they play at being cops for the night.

What follows is a completely contrived plot that stretches the premise way too far as they buy an old police car on ebay, finesse their act and start to really enjoy it. They bicker between themselves about how far to take it, fool the real police and inadvertently attract the attention of a fearsome Eurotrash gang boss who orders their deaths.

Of course there's a completely ridiculous thriller climax where they somehow save the day and become real heroes, but none of that matters – it's about the punchlines and nothing more.