Johnny English

This is one of those movies peppered with those occasional gut-busting scenes that we have come to expect with a comic actor on the order of Atkinson, but is substantially more full of a lot of disposable humor in the form of English's bumbling; for example, going to the wrong building, going up the "poop shoot," Sauvage's coronation (which is probably the best/worst example of this) etc. It comes across as strained and ultimately worthless for comic effect. I despise the kind of humor that is stretched much too far to be funny. It is so telegraphed that mid-way through the movie you can invariably anticipate exactly WHAT he is bumbling into and whatever vague humor it had is butchered. It becomes excruciating.

I would, however, enjoy seeing this turn into a screen franchise for Atkinson--IF (and this is a big IF) they give him a solid screenplay to work with. The plot and characters were all fine--even Malkovich's purposefully ridiculous French accent (and clearly John M. is slumming for a few bucks in this one)--but the movie lacked vaguely consistent humor. The bumbling James Bond-ish character is a one-noter--Atkinson would be funnier in funny SITUATIONS (I daresay mini-"Bean"-type scenes peppered throughout the movie) that are not strained to reveal merely how bumbling and stupid he can be (yes, by 15 minutes into the movie we GET how bumbling English is - don't spend the entire movie explaining it to us again and again).

Comedy is tough to write and tougher to execute on - but Atkinson has the chops to handle it. He just needs the right material. There were a few gem moments and enough "chuckle humor" to make this a worthy rental. Imbruglia is respectable as his female counterpart -- and none too tough on the eyes. She could be an excellent female lead in a franchise.