Metacritic reviews

The staging of the physical comedy in The Pink Panther is not always adept - director Shawn Levy is no Blake Edwards - but Martin, who co-wrote the screenplay, keeps spinning in his own orbit anyway. And what an orbit it is.

Martin makes a fine Clouseau, re-energizing musty old physical gags involving chandeliers and priceless vases, and rolling his tongue around a zesty form of pidgin French. If he ever finds his Blake Edwards, there may be hope for this franchise yet.

Neither the disaster one might have suspected nor a fully realized madcap farce; rather, Steve Martin's foray as Inspector Clouseau exhibits bursts of wild-and-craziness, but hardly enough to sustain even its relatively brief running time.

Martin's gift for physical and vocal comedy is as deft as ever.

An occasionally amusing but wrongheaded remake that arrives more than four decades after the original blazed across the screen.

Even with the inspired choice of Steve Martin in the Clouseau role, this "Panther" picture is more bumbling and fumbling than the blissfully oblivious, accident-prone Inspector.

Mr. Levy's cold, streamlined direction gives the movie the feel of a mechanical contraption manipulated by remote control with a nervous finger on the fast-forward button. Many of the jokes barely have time to register before we're on to the next stunt.

At every moment in the movie, I was aware that Peter Sellers was Clouseau, and Steve Martin was not. I hadn't realized how thoroughly Sellers and Edwards had colonized my memory.

This, the 10th and worst-written entry in the series, would have been better if it had followed Dreyfuss instead of Clouseau, or if Kline had been cast as Clouseau instead of Martin.

Ultimately, one has to chalk up The Pink Panther to the good old traditions of Hollywood greed and chutzpah. Nothing this slapdash and badly executed is done for the love of movies.