Mortdecai aims to add another character that makes a parody of the British spy genre, such as Austin Powers and Johnny English. The movie builds a caricature of the English culture, as everyone acts like a cartoon. It's appealing enough, but despite of its utter quirkiness, the movie lacks distinction and even a witty sense of humor. The jokes often feel forced, only to live up to its absurdity, but the real laughs are occasional. There is a delightful personality within this world, but this is a very uninspired mockery that most likely leads to nothing.
The film works at being a cartoon. Most of the characters are unreasonable human beings, for the sake of embracing its silliness. The characters are easy enough to recognize, each of them are defined with a punchline, like Mortdecai being overly classed and overvaluing his mustache, while his servant/muscle, Jock, is bounded by his loyalty and the habit of having sex with young women, meanwhile the lead Inspector has the secret intention of stealing Mortdecai's wife. The problem is these jokes get stale pretty quick and repeating them every ten minutes or so doesn't help anything at all. The only trait that is worth repeating here is the witness who insults people politely, but that character left the picture too soon. Making these characters broader doesn't benefit anything at all, and rather makes them even more difficult to care about.
The plot never really matters, it's really all about the characters having the tendency of fooling around, but the jokes are so dated and it never really shines. This is an R-rated film, by the way, but its sense of humor feels like it appeals better for a younger crowd, that not even its sexual references can hide it. To be fair, its bright images bring things to life, perfectly presents what this movie is designed for. The talents are charming and committed to its quirks, but how their characters are written rather makes it look shameful. Johnny Depp for instance, while he enjoys being the weirdo with a 'stache, looks like he is required to ham it up. The cheap jokes in the script is so relied on his common performance of being goofy. It's more exhausting than amusing. The only actor who builds a real character here is Paul Bettany, despite that his role is meant to be a typical hard-as-nails henchman, his moments with Depp makes them a nice memorable oddball pair.
Mortdecai is wondrously fond at being lighthearted, but if the movie doesn't allow itself to be genuinely funny, it just becomes tedious and annoying. There are some nice touches of a fun film here, but the staleness strangely keeps the audience from any joy. It is meant to be a throwback, but most of it is like a forced nostalgia, but the real problem really is the lack of smarter gags, even for a context that doesn't make sense could have at least been creative. And it gets much frustrating when even its charismatic talents couldn't save it from its lameness. Even if you have the same generosity as I do towards light- toned films like this, Mortdecai just hardly speaks to anyone.
The film works at being a cartoon. Most of the characters are unreasonable human beings, for the sake of embracing its silliness. The characters are easy enough to recognize, each of them are defined with a punchline, like Mortdecai being overly classed and overvaluing his mustache, while his servant/muscle, Jock, is bounded by his loyalty and the habit of having sex with young women, meanwhile the lead Inspector has the secret intention of stealing Mortdecai's wife. The problem is these jokes get stale pretty quick and repeating them every ten minutes or so doesn't help anything at all. The only trait that is worth repeating here is the witness who insults people politely, but that character left the picture too soon. Making these characters broader doesn't benefit anything at all, and rather makes them even more difficult to care about.
The plot never really matters, it's really all about the characters having the tendency of fooling around, but the jokes are so dated and it never really shines. This is an R-rated film, by the way, but its sense of humor feels like it appeals better for a younger crowd, that not even its sexual references can hide it. To be fair, its bright images bring things to life, perfectly presents what this movie is designed for. The talents are charming and committed to its quirks, but how their characters are written rather makes it look shameful. Johnny Depp for instance, while he enjoys being the weirdo with a 'stache, looks like he is required to ham it up. The cheap jokes in the script is so relied on his common performance of being goofy. It's more exhausting than amusing. The only actor who builds a real character here is Paul Bettany, despite that his role is meant to be a typical hard-as-nails henchman, his moments with Depp makes them a nice memorable oddball pair.
Mortdecai is wondrously fond at being lighthearted, but if the movie doesn't allow itself to be genuinely funny, it just becomes tedious and annoying. There are some nice touches of a fun film here, but the staleness strangely keeps the audience from any joy. It is meant to be a throwback, but most of it is like a forced nostalgia, but the real problem really is the lack of smarter gags, even for a context that doesn't make sense could have at least been creative. And it gets much frustrating when even its charismatic talents couldn't save it from its lameness. Even if you have the same generosity as I do towards light- toned films like this, Mortdecai just hardly speaks to anyone.