And it honestly should have been. With this nice ensemble and decent budget, great production design, and a director who in theory definitely should have the chops, THE MINISTRY OF UNGENTLEMANLY WARFARE had everything it needed and more.
And yet, it misses the mark. Much of it has to do with the direction, I'm afraid. A lack of spirit and inspiration can be felt throughout the film, sometimes worse than other times, but neither the shots he called nor his direction of the actors are worthy of Ritchie's potential. The script could have used a bit more polishing, especially concerning the dialogue, but it's really mostly the practical aspects where this falls flat.
If you're a native German speaker, you will also notice how bad the fake Germans actually are. They should have been dubbed, but nobody seemed to care. Even Til Schweiger messed up some lines in German (probably drunk on set, as usual) - nobody cared.
What also made the film worse than it could have been is the score. Someone told the composer to go for "Schifrin meets Morricone", I guess, and what he delivered was a weak attempt at copying both. No swing, no drama, no feeling whatsoever. Just flat and boring, matching the direction perfectly.
That being said, you can still kill a bit of time watching this, since Cavill, Ritchson, et al are very likeable and have a lot of charming presence. Locations are nice, the DoP did a great job with the lighting, and Eiza González has a great singing performance (refreshingly with no audible pitch correction, but as a professional singer with an amazing voice she really doesn't need any), even though the arrangement and interpretation of the famous "Mack The Knife" is quite horrible.
But if anything, this has made me wish for a more silly WW2 comedy with Cary Elwes in the lead. I'd buy that for a dollar.
