Leslie Nielsen for the part of Lt. Frank Drebin deserves a special place in the annals of brilliant casting choices.

Liam Neeson almost works as a Drebin for a new, coarser, meaner age, and he has no problem suggesting a surly, disgruntled son of the cop immortalized by Leslie Nielsen in the short-lived 1982 TV series “Police Squad!

That is the great gift of director and co-writer Akiva Schaffer ’s The Naked Gun (August 1), a continuation of the beloved 1980s and ’90s police spoof film series. At its best, this new Naked Gun is a dumb, loopy delight, a return to the kind of comedy that was woefully taken for granted in its heyday and now barely exists at all.