We live in a divided world. There are two categories of inhabitants of the planet between which there can be no compromise of any kind. There are those who like comedies with Rowan Atkinson (and with Jerry Lewis, Lous de Funes, Jim Carrey, etc.). There are those who do not like these comedies. I am part of the first category. My chance (and my unforgivable guilt for those in the other category) is that I can laugh healthily, heartly and without apologizing to a movie like ‘Johnny English Strikes Again‘.
The ‘story’. Britain is exposed to a series of cyber attacks. One of them makes public data and photos of all active spies of the English intelligence services, which makes them unusable. Prime Minister Emma Thompson, a respected lady with a short haircut (any resemblance to a British Prime Minister, respected lady and with a short haircut is a coincidence), has to resort to Johnny English (Rowan Atkinson) , the same super-incompetent and super-self-confident guy we know from previous films. At the same time, the Prime Minister plans to entrust all the country’s computer operations to the young owner of a highly successful hi-tech company who already controls much of the world’s cyber-secrets (any similarity with real persons is also a coincidence). With the help of technical gadgets that were sophisticated innovations … 4-5 decades ago, of a Russian female spy who is a superior form of the organization of matter (Olga Kurylenko), and of his phenomenal luck, Johnny English goes on mission to save the world. Does all this seem incredible or laughable? Read the (serious) press and you find more incredible and more laughable news (and personalities) daily.
I had fun and I laughed twice as much as at any other comedy lately. Director David Kerr, a specialist of TV comedies, is at his first feature film, but we do not feel this at all. The action is fluent in the logic of the parodies of super-spy movies such as ‘James Bond’ or ‘Mission Impossible’. The team of actors plays with visible pleasure, Rowan Atkinson carries out the full range of his comic gigs, but we also discover the comedy talents of Emma Thompson on this occasion. What is original and adds to the comic effect of the film is the hero’s preference for the spy retro tools of James Bond’s and Jimmy English’s youth. Tradition (as we know it from spy movies and novels) is confronted with the contemporary world of the Internet and smart phones. Adding Rowan Atkinson, the mix becomes comically explosive.