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Helen M Jerome reviews
Sony Pictures Home Entertainment
- Cert:
- Cat.no: MRD41706
- Running time: 93 minutes
- Year: 2005
- Pressing: 2006
- Region(s): 2, PAL
- Sound: Dolby Digital 5.1
- Languages: English
- Subtitles: English, English for the hard of hearing, Dutch, Hindi
- Widescreen: 1.85:1
- 16:9-Enhanced: Yes
- Macrovision: Yes
- Disc Format: DVD 9
- Price: £19.99
- Extras: Director’s Commentary; Deleted and Extended Scenes; Alternate Opening Sequence; Cracking the Case Documentary; Animated Trip Featurette on the development of the opening title animation, and more.
Director:
- Shawn Levy
Pink Panther 2006: 
Original Movie Collection:
Producer:
- Robert Simonds
Cast:
- Inspector Jacques Clouseau: Steve Martin
Chief Inspector Dreyfus: Kevin Kline
Gendarme Gilbert Ponton: Jean Reno
Xania: Beyonc Knowles
Nicole: Emily Mortimer
Laroque: Roger Rees
Agent 006 Nigel Boswell: Clive Owen
Cherie: Kristin Chenoweth
Yves Gluant: Jason Statham
A recent statistic revealed that films are much longer than they used to be.
Too long, according to many movie lovers. Perhaps because of sloppy editing, the power of the director or just wanting to show where every last cent of that enormous budget went. And this film is precisely 93 minutes too long.
It’s not that the original Peter Sellers renditions of bumbling Clouseau were as brilliant as many remember them. It’s not that anything in popular culture is sacred and cannot be remade. And it’s not as if Steve Martin isn’t a comic genius and all-round aesthete who would be a shoo-in at any fantasy dinner party.
So why is this version so dreadful in almost every way? Why does the heart sink every time Martin launches into his faux-French accent? He was brilliantly restrained in the recent and smartly arty Shopgirl, his physical comedy was fabulous in The Jerk, All Of Me, and The Man With Two Brains. Always playing the American guy at odds with the rest of society – a misfit in his own land. But playing a Frenchman out of place in France and briefly in the Big Apple? Non! Thees ees a meestake. A beeg meestake, Steeve.
Supporting actors Kevin Kline, Jean Reno (who is more convincingly French as he actually is French), and Emily Mortimer try their best. Brits Clive Owen and Jason Statham are uncredited, which might be a wise decision, though a close-up would probably reveal their tongues firmly in their suave cheeks and their hands on their pay cheques. Beyonc flirts with the camera and gets to sing a big number, but her slim role is virtually product placement.
Okay, Shawn Levy (of Cheaper By The Dozen fame) is no Blake Edwards. And the contrived opening ‘soccer’ scene feels inauthentic, shiny and Americanised. The plot noodles along with the Pink Panther diamond going missing, the murder of the French soccer team’s manager (Statham) and the animosity between Kline’s Dreyfus and his nemesis, Clouseau, potentially setting up some drama, but really leading to a succession of pratfalls amidst some establishing shots of Paris.
Scrabbling around for positives to take away from this DVD, there are one or two enjoyable extras included, apart from the usual deleted scenes, commentary and endless backslapping features. Beyonc’s fans will appreciate some extra music from the Destiny’s Child diva. The alternate opening sequence, with 3D animation of the Panther instead of the more jokey version they used, is worth watching. Plus you can watch a doco on how the jokey version was developed.
One can only hope that they’re not planning a follow-up.
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Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.