Ahoy, squirts! Quint here with an early look from a test screening of Steve Martin's take on THE PINK PANTHER. It makes me sad to hear that Martin is out and out unfunny in the film... I remember when everything he touched turned to gold... even his mediocre stuff made me laugh. Now, he's following up his utterly embarrassing turn in Joe Dante's LOONEY TUNES: BACK IN ACTION with what appears to be another flop. I hope the filmmakers work the rough cut shown into a really funny movie. The last thing I want is to see another shitty Steve Martin movie, but if the below review is any indicator they have their work cut out for them.
Hey guys,
First time reviewer here, and I wanted to let you know that I saw the first screening of the new Pink Panther movie with Steve Martin tonight out on Long Island. I won't go into many spoilers, but I will say that I was the last one in the theater doing my screening card. I had alot to say. Man, I wish they gave you more room on there.
Well, basically the problem with the movie is that Steve Martin is just not funny, period. You have a hard time believing that it's Clouseau, and not just Steve Martin with a silly French accent. There's the occasional funny moment (wait till you see the airplane intro scene), but most of it is the obligatory comedy in 3's, and they just fall flat 95% of the time. For instance, a large gold globe that Clouseau lets loose from his office, rolls down the street in Paris, only to reappear a few days later and hit someone, and then again appear out of nowhere weeks later in NYC. I really hate it when a film assumes their audience is stupid, for example, the entire setup of the film.
The animated title sequence was not completed last night so we started with Clouseau choosing a cell phone ring from his computer. He makes a mistake and shuts off all the power on the planet....yes, the PLANET. We then meet Kevin Kline's Dreyfuss who talks to us as a narrator about the first time he met Clouseau, and we're taken to a soccer game where Jason Statham (Snatch is one of my favorite movies) is the soccer coach for France, and he wears the Pink Panther ring. Yadda yadda yadda, after the game he is mysteriously killed and the ring, well, you guessed it, stolen. Now we go BACK to Kline talking about how he is to get this award that he has been nominated for 7 times previously, but never wins. And if he can catch the killer, he will most definitly get it. But he instead decides to hire an "imcompetent" to do the work for him and he'll take over right at the end. This was basically the dialogue, and I felt dumber after being hit over the head with the premise for what must have been 10-15 minutes of exposition.
But the real problem was that after he said he needed an idiot, we're THEN taken back to Clouseau and his "hey, i'm a bumbling idiot all the time" scene. But what good is this scene after we've already been shown he can shut down the planet by hitting "download" on his computer. One of them needs to go, and it's the former, not the latter. Basically, this whole opening set up needs to be seriously re-thought out and edited. It just seemed like too much.
I won't even get into the ending, but it's absurd, with no setup, not even remotely funny, and just plain irritating to watch. As a movie goer, I felt insulted.
The film wasn't all bad though. The locations were nicely shot, although it was all too easy to tell when they would switch to a soundstage, then go back to location and vice versa. A police holding door looked particulary different depending on which way you were seeing it. Jean Reno turned in a nice performance in an underutilized role, and the score was surprisingly finished, although nothing memorable except for different takes on the Pink Panther theme (latin, club, etc). Also, Beyonce just looks gorgeous in the movie. Her role is eye candy though, and it's obvious she'll be pushing a CD in July '05 when this comes out.
Sorry for the lengthy review, but I felt like I needed to express my concerns about the film. I sincerely hope they put out a better movie next summer, as I am a big fan of Peter Sellers and the original movies.
-Gregg-
