So as many of you know, I like the second film the most as it felt more like a
James Bond spoof than these two films. But I also enjoy the first and third ones as well. So today we're looking at two films that gave Rowan Atkinson a way to basically be a spy with the slapstick style of humour we often see in his
Mr. Bean character and I got to say, its pretty darn good. So having already reviewed the second film which itself is an all time favourite film of mine, let's look at the film that started it all as well as the most recent film of the series which sees the return of a familiar sidekick:
Johnny English
The fictional MI7 one day sees the loss of many of its agents with Agent One (played by Greg Wise) having died in a submarine accident and the other agents being assassinated as his funeral. This of course leaves only one man left who can finish up the job Agent One did and that person is the kindhearted but inept Johnny English (played by Atkinson). English is assigned to watch over the crown jewels in an attempt to prevent anyone from stealing them, but ends up failing in his mission and pretends to fight the assailant to cover up his tracks. English later teams up with fellow agent Angus Bough (played by Ben Miller) as they go about finding said jewels while learning of an evil dictator hell bent on turning all of the UK into a countrywide prison. While not a perfect film by any means,
Johnny English manages to be a very good spy spoof film with quite possibly the best person you could ask for to play the titular spy. The comedy is a bit forced at times, but gold mostly and it has some very memorable lines too. Its a lot of fun, doesn't take itself too seriously and its just a blast to watch if you're not all keen on serious English spy films. 8/10
Strikes Again
Many years have passed and English (reprised by Atkinson) has taken up a job to be a geography teacher (though secretly he's training his students in the world of espionage). But when MI7 becomes the target of a cyber attack, they are forced to reinstate any inactive agents to stop this attack. Inadvertently English is once again the last man standing and takes on the mission using only old tech, an Aston Martin and his partner on the field Bough (reprised by Miller) in an attempt to not be swayed over to the new stuff and the Apple like user agreements. Travelling to the south of France, the pair find the origin of the cyber attack which happens to be a yacht boat called the Dot Calm and begin a series of shenanigans yet again in an attempt to reveal the true nature of a Elon Musk like billionaire said to be able to save Britain from the cyber attacks (I have said too much. My bad :( ). You know in this film it feels like its not trying to be as ambitious as the second film and just wants to keep it as simple as possible while letting Atkinson do his own stunts and taking advantage of current technologies like tablets, VR and something that closely resembles things like Amazon's Alexa, Apple's Siri, OK Google and Microsoft's Cortana among others. Its a good film with lots to enjoy and plenty of laughs to be had. It just may be playing things too safe this time around which sometimes is OK and other times is not OK. So yeah still not a perfect film like its predecessors, but a good one nonetheless. 8/10
So there you have it. I still think the second one is the best one, but I also enjoy watching these two as well even though
Strikes Again may be playing things too safely.
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