BEFORE: Well, we were supposed to get a new James Bond film released in April, now that's been pushed back to November because of the Covid virus. I'm more upset about "New Mutants" being delayed for a fourth (or fifth?) time, and also "Black Widow", but what can I do? I was going to review those films in September/October anyway, now we'll see if that will still be possible, with all of the movie theaters closed and a ban on public gatherings more than a few people. It's like this virus knew right where to hit us to do the maximum damage to the U.S. economy - movie theaters, restaurants and sporting events. Damn, if that isn't the backbone of our country's industry in the disposable income sector, I don't know what is.
Here I made a schedule to get me through to Mother's Day, and now I may not be able to complete it - I can't get to the office to access some Academy screeners, many of the films are available on iTunes or premium On Demand, but those charges are going to add up very quickly. I may have to consider changing my plan, only I don't want to.
Emma Thompson carries over from "Men in Black: International". And since we're not getting James Bond any time soon, here's an acceptable (?) substitute.
FOLLOW-UP TO: "Johnny English Reborn" (Movie #1,440)
THE PLOT: After a cyber-attack reveals the identities of all the undercover agents in Britain, Johnny English is forced to come out of retirement to find the mastermind hacker.
AFTER: I'm still not much in the mood for laughing, but this film's starting to help the process. They undoubtedly did not make this comedy with the intent of helping anyone keep their spirits up during a pandemic, but their efforts were still appreciated by me. Rowan Atkinson has a knack for playing this kind of character, someone who means well, but keeps mucking things up, and fails so spectacularly that somehow a success results, impossibly or very improbably, at the very end. That's what I remember "Mr. Bean's Holiday" being like, it's just odd to see him play nearly the same character, only one that can also talk.
I watched the previous "Johnny English" film back in 2013, just a few films before doing a deep dive into all the James Bond films (I didn't start with "Dr. No", though, I began with the 2006 "Casino Royale" and then "Quantum of Solace", then went back to "Dr. No" and moved forward, but it all still worked out OK) - and then the following year Atkinson turned up in a small role in "Never Say Never Again", that Connery-based film that was something of a narrative anomaly in 1983. So it's a bit weird that Atkinson's resumé contains both a James Bond film and a 3-film parody of the Bond films. Right?
Anyway, here he plays an agent who's been retired for a number of years, apparently after his disgraceful behavior at the end of "Johnny English Reborn", and has been teaching school. (If you're keeping count, 4 of the last 5 films have taken place partially in U.K. schools - of course, this week is being retroactively recognized for everything being partially or totally set in Great Britain...). He's been working spy lessons in to the classroom study, so the kids are learning about the art of disguise, how to slide down zip-lines and what to say to a pretty lady over drinks.
But when a hacker hacks and publicly outs all of the U.K. agents, they need to recall an older agent back into service - one who's barely aware of the digital age, who still uses payphones and non-hybrid cars, which actually seems pretty smart because then the bad guys will "never see him coming". Only they totally will, because he's not very good at being unobtrusive. He wants to use an old-fashioned gun along with the crazy tech gadgets from the agency's archive, ones that have been in storage and the newer agents don't even know to ask for. He also requests the services of trusty Bough (pronounced "Buff"), who was in the first Johnny English film but got edited out of the second.
Unfortunately, like "Men in Black: International", this film did an appallingly poor job of hiding the indentity of the villain - I suppose that's a nod to the Bond films, because there's never really much doubt about who's the bad guy (it's the guy in the secret island lair, with the satellite aimed at the world's capitals, right?) so in their own ways, the early Bond films are just as simplistic as Westerns - white hat, black hat and all that. Anyway, I would have preferred a bit more mystery here, it's exactly who I thought it would be, and therefore his introduction in the film is so coincidental, it's not even funny or shocking, just obvious.
The U.K. is then plagued by further cyber-attacks, ones that turn every traffic light to red, then something happens to the London Eye, only I wasn't exactly sure what happened there. As we've learned in the U.S., keep your eye on the person who says, "I alone can fix this", because he just can't be trusted. Agent English, meanwhile, has a disastrous training session with a VR machine, and thus causes much slapstick mayhem of his own across London while he THINKS he's in the VR world.
I'm feeling generous tonight because I really needed the laughs, we're all going to need to stay calm and keep our spirits up in the days and weeks ahead. I still don't know if it's appropriate to enjoy comedy right now, but I'm still going to forge ahead with it when I can.
Also starring Rowan Atkinson (last seen in "Never Say Never Again"), Olga Kurylenko (last seen in "Paris, Je t'Aime"), Ben Miller (last seen in "Paddington 2"), Adam James (last seen in "Last Chance Harvey"), Jake Lacy (last seen in "Rampage"), Vicki Pepperdine (last seen in "Goodbye Christopher Robin"), Pippa Bennett-Warner (last seen in "Wakefield"), Miranda Hennessey, Irena Tyshyna, David Mumeni, Tuncay Gunes, Samantha Russell, Nick Owenford, Junichi Kajioka, Matthew Beard (last seen in "The Imitation Game"), Pauline McLynn, with cameos from Michael Gambon (also last seen in "Paddington 2"), Charles Dance (last seen in "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies"), Edward Fox (last seen in "A Bridge Too Far").
RATING: 6 out of 10 jelly babies
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