There was a time when the teaming of Steve Martin, John Cleese and Lily Tomlin would have sent tsunami sized ripples through the comedy world. Mr. Wild and Crazy paired with comedy legends from Monty Python and Laugh In would have guaranteed laughs and big box office mojo. That would have been 1978. Unfortunately for us and them, it’s 2009. The three comedy legends co-star in the unimaginatively titled Pink Panther 2, an uninspired and unnecessary sequel to Martin’s 2006 reimagining of the classic Peter Seller’s character.
The movie’s premise is thin even for a February comedy. In fact, it’s thin enough to make Paul Blart: Mall Cop look nuanced. It begins with a super villain named El Tornado thieving the world’s greatest treasures—the Magna Carta from England, Italy’s Shroud of Turin and a Japanese Imperial Sword. Chief Inspector Dreyfus (John Cleese) of the French police is forced to assign Jacques Clouseau, “the world’s greatest detective,” to the case. The situation becomes complicated when El Tornado steals the national French treasure The Pink Panther and Clouseau must work with an international team of detectives to solve the case.
Inspector Clouseau has suffered cinematic indignities in the past. Both Roger Moore and Alan Arkin bungled their way through past adaptations, but the Martin’s take on the character lowers the bar to untold depths. There was a time when Martin’s out-there brand of humor shook up the comedy world, rebelling against exactly the kind of comedy pabulum that is imprinted on every frame of Panther 2.
Where to start?
His ever changing vocal inflection sounds like Elmer Fudd doing the Wild and Crazy Guys accent. More annoying than funny. More annoying than anything else.
The script, the thing that passes for comedy writing here, is formulaic and flat. There isn’t a line in this movie that even approaches the pure comedy mania of the “That is not my doog” scene in The Pink Panther Strikes Back and even the slapstick is so predictable that Buster Keaton would have thought of these gags as old hat. Only one set piece, where Clouseau burns down a restaurant while juggling bottles of wine, hints at what could have been if anyone on either side of the camera put in the effort.
Worst of all is Martin’s take on the character. In Seller’s hands the Clouseau was an inspired collection of quirks and tics; a doofus but a well meaning one. Martin has subtly changed Clouseau into an arrogant, petty bumbler. The difference? One was lovable and funny and one isn’t.
February is quickly turning into the “I’m only in it for the money month” where good actors stoop to making crap for a quick paycheque. It’s bad enough that Martin makes movies like this, but why does he have to bring Andy Garcia, Jeremy Irons, Alfred Molina and Jean Reno down with him?
The first Martin Pink Panther wasn’t funny but nonetheless made a lot of money. As a potential audience member keep this old saying in mind, “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.” Don’t get sucked in again. Stay home. Rent A Shot in the Dark and remember when someone knew how to get real laughs playing the clueless Inspector Clouseau.
There was a time when Steve Martin’s idiot character was truly original and funny. Twenty-five years ago when he made films like The Jerk and Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid Martin was the jackass du jour, an actor who could deftly mix slapstick with pathos and transcend the genre. Think The Three Stooges mixed with Moliere.
In the eighties and nineties his films took on a higher, more sophisticated tone. Recently, however, his work has been more commercial, and quite uneven. Cheaper By the Dozen and Bringing Down the House made big cash and re-established him as a box office draw but will do nothing for his comic legacy.
Which brings us to The Pink Panther.
Forty-two years ago Peter Sellers created one of the screen’s most indelible comic characters, the bumbling Inspector Clouseau. Since then there have been several attempts to recreate the Seller’s magic—Alan Arkin and Roberto Benigni have both tried and failed—with the most recent being Steve Martin.
Martin gives it his all but never rises above mimicking Peter Sellers. As Martin—using an accent reminiscent of a French Elmer Fudd—pratfalls his way through this caper film I was constantly reminded of other, better movies. Of course the ghost of Peter Sellers looms large, but also Martin’s earlier work. A scene with Martin and Jean Reno as unlikely bedmates made me long for the similar and funnier scene with John Candy in Planes, Trains and Automobiles. A dance interlude reminded me of Martin’s famous dance with Gilda Radner on Saturday Night Live. In short, nothing in this film feels original.
The Pink Panther has a couple of laughs, but I’d recommend sticking to the real deal and checking out the recent Pink Panther DVD box set featuring Peter Sellers.
In recent years Steve Martin has made a career of playing father figures. Usually he has a whole brood of wacky kids who help him scoop up all the money that his family comedies earn at the box office. In Shopgirl—based on the novella of the same name by Martin—he plays a different kind of character—he’s still a father figure but this time he’s dating a woman young enough to be his daughter.
Claire Danes plays the title character, a young woman torn between an older rich man who lavishes his riches, but not his undivided attention on her, and the younger Jason Swartzman who resembles a puppy dog—always happy to see her, but also kind of hyper and annoying.
This is Martin’s first role in some time in which he actually acts. His performance here is a throwback to the days of films like The Spanish Prisoner and Novocaine, when his characters didn’t simply react to the antics of his film family but actually had some substance.
Like Kirsten Dunst’s recent bravura performance in Elizabethtown, Claire Danes breaks through here as a really compelling screen actress. With her willowy good looks and slightly melancholic air she is perfect for the role of the damaged but optimistic Mirabelle.
Shopgirl isn’t a typical romantic comedy. Martin is too smart for that. The story has whimsical elements, but both as a screenwriter and actor Martin brings a quiet melancholy to the movie that speaks volumes about heartbreak and love lost.
If only it had been just a tad shorter and the schmaltzy music a tad bit less overbearing, Shopgirl, could have been one of the best films of the year.
In recent years Steve Martin has a made a career playing frazzled fathers in a series of forgettable family comedies with names like Father of the Bride, Bringing Down the House and the first Cheaper by the Dozen. The movies may be bland, but they are successful at the box office. In 2003 Cheaper by the Dozen’s brood of brats became the highest grossing comedy of all time, raking in $138 million. With numbers like that on the balance sheet a sequel was inevitable. In part two, out of DVD this week, Martin and his unruly family of twelve kids take a vacation to cottage country. To their horror they discover that they are sharing the lake with Martin’s childhood foe and a game of one upsmanship ensues. The movie fails on so many levels it’s hard to know where to start. It is crudely made, not very funny and there is more real family interaction on any episode of The Simpson’s than in this movie, but the thing that really rankles is watching the incredible comic talent of Steve Martin, once one of the sharpest comedic actors going, blunted by doing insipid material like this.
There was a time when the teaming of Steve Martin, John Cleese and Lily Tomlin would have sent tsunami sized ripples through the comedy world. Mr. Wild and Crazy paired with comedy legends from Monty Python and Laugh In would have guaranteed laughs and big box office mojo. That would have been 1978. Unfortunately for us and them, it’s 2009. The three comedy legends co-star in the unimaginatively titled Pink Panther 2, an uninspired and unnecessary sequel to Martin’s 2006 reimagining of the classic Peter Seller’s character.
