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London,
Derek Malcolm's rating
Reader rating
Dir: Steve Bendelack.
Cast: Rowan Atkinson, Max Baldry, Emma de Caunes, Willem Dafoe
Description: Lady Luck smiles on Mr Bean when he wins a dream holiday to Cannes via Eurostar in his local church raffle. With his tiny suitcase packed and his documents safely in the pocket of his blazer, Mr Bean ventures boldly into Paris, absorbing the sights and culture. Leaving chaos in his wake as he makes his way to the main train station, Bean samples the local cuisine (including an eye-watering encounter with oysters), manages to separate an award-winning Russian film director from his young son, falls under the spell of a pretty actress, and falls foul of the language barrier as he enjoys the holiday of a lifetime.
Country: UK. 2007. 89mins
Tour de farce: Rowan Atkinson's adult-child is no Monsieur Hulot
Rowan Atkinson's Mr Bean is an acquired taste, but one that has been tasted and found good around the globe - despite plenty of snooty notices from critics.
His big-screen revival has the blundering adult-child (now middle-aged and thus slightly more spooky in essence) winning a holiday at the Cannes Festival in a raffle.
It will either have you collapsed in a fit of the giggles throughout or sitting stony-faced in the stalls pondering why you spent the ticket money.
Bean is even more of a grunting imbecile than ever. He finally arrives in Cannes, after some suitably hair-raising adventures, during the presentation of an appalling film from a pretentious director (Willem Dafoe) who has previously taken his life into his hands by making Bean an extra in one of his commercials. Naturally the Cannes entry is also torpedoed. All Mr Bean wants to do is paddle on the beach.
Emma de Caunes is the vague love interest (which seems unlikely since Bean, whatever else he is, seems virtually sexless). And Max Baldry plays a small boy, son of one of the jurors, with whom Bean gets hopelessly lost on the way to the festival.
Atkinson's Bean clearly takes his cue from both theatrical mime and the silent cinema, especially in this film, where he hardly speaks. The difference is that the physical comedy involved comes largely from a myriad of facial expressions which is in direct contrast to Chaplin, Keaton or Harold Lloyd.
To say the humour throughout is basic would be to put it extremely mildly. But then so was that of some of the silent clowns upon whom Bean is based. The film-makers say they are aware that comparisons might be made with Jacques Tati's classic Monsieur Hulot's Holiday. Not by me they won't.
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I wasn't a Mr Bean fan, but after taking my children to see this film I certainly am now. The whole production was brilliant, Rowan Atkinson's sense of timing was brilliant - especially the opera sketch. The photography excellent. A great movie for adults and of course, don't forget the children.
- Peggy Brodie, Reading Berkshire UK
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