Pedro Coelho

... and yet, I see a mediocre rating on IMDB... what the heck?

So I read the reviews... some people complain it's not true to the original. It might not be, I've no idea, I haven't read the original stories, it wasn't a thing in my country, in my childhood. But the fact that the film departs from the original book, doesn't make it automatically bad. And in fact, it's a blast from beginning to end.

And then there are all those people who complain about insensitive humor and all... well, to them all I have to say are John Cleese's words:

"If people can't control their own emotions, then they have to start trying to control other people's behavior.' And when you're around super-sensitive people, you cannot relax and be spontaneous because you have no idea what's going to upset them next.

And that's why I've been warned recently don't go to most university campuses because the political correctness has been taken from being a good idea, which is let's not be mean in particular to people who are not able to look after themselves very well - that's a good idea - to the point where any kind of criticism of any individual or group could be labeled cruel.

And the whole point about humor, the whole point about comedy, and believe you me I thought about this, is that all comedy is critical. ... All humor is critical. If you start to say, 'We mustn't; we mustn't criticize or offend them,' then humor is gone. With humor goes a sense of proportion. And then as far as I'm concerned, you're living in '1984.'"