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BY PETER KEOUGH
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After watching our leaders make fools of themselves on the news recently, what a relief to take in some idiotic bungling without insidious intent or dire consequences. Peter Howitt’s film has made a pile at the box office in Britain and the rest of Europe and should do the same here with its much-needed mindless comic relief. After every British Intelligence (now an oxymoron?) agent has been killed in an explosion, the title functionary (Rowan Atkinson) gets to fulfill his dream of being a dashing superspy. His assignment: find out who wants to steal the Crown Jewels. What English discovers about French billionaire businessman Pascal Sauvage (John Malkovich, willfully awful in a bad wig and a worse accent) is unacceptable to official channels, but what will matter more to audiences is Atkinson’s sublimely orchestrated pomposity, pitifulness, and pluck. In the fine tradition of Peter Sellers’s Inspector Clouseau and Leslie Nielsen’s Lieutenant Frank Drebin, he’s utterly confident, invariably wrong, and ultimately victorious. Perhaps the film reflects anxiety about our Intelligence services or antagonism toward the French, but it all comes down to English climbing out of a toilet covered with poop or, after accidentally self-dosing himself with muscle relaxant, flopping on the floor and saying, "flahflahflah." How does Johnny English rate compared with the all-time greatest dumb comedy? On the Three Amigos scale, I’d give it a solid two amigos. (88 minutes)
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