James Coco is trying to get rid of a luxury ship he owns to get the insurance. But since his character is unable to pick up a phone like a normal person (a tiresome running gag) you just know his scheme is going to backfire in his face. Professional con man Charleston (Bud Spencer) and his trio of stupid English henchmen (amongst them are Catweazle himself and Toht from Raiders of the Lost Ark) are planning to double cross him. You see, not only is big burly Spencer a master criminal, he's a master of disguise as well. If you can believe that you'll swallow anything. First the four of them swipe a priceless Gaugin from the home of a police inspector, naturally portrayed by Herbert Lom. Chief Inspector Dreyfus plays Faye Dunnaway to Spencers's Steve McQueen (he has to, as there are no interesting female parts in this picture) and after some talky scenes that break all the rules of perspective they more or less team up to get Coco and his boat (respectively). The ways they go about to do this are too far fetched to recount here. Most of the humour is so infantile that only a six year might chuckle at it and though I hate to admit it, James Coco's shtick with various telephones actually draws the most laughs. The camera work takes a turn for the worse when people start having discussions while driving around in cars. Obviously the filmmakers never heard of a steady cam. Oh yeah there is one slightly amusing gag involving footsie Morse code, but thats about it.
Most disappointing of all is the lack of fight scenes. This is a Bud Spencer flick after all. But the Big Bearded Lug prefers playing the piano (or at least pretends to) as he and his gang sing a whiny Whiskey song. After that, and for no good reason at all, he actually goes up on stage to do a little dance with chorus girls. This is what people mean when they say a musical number can bring an entire movie to a grinding halt. At last there is one extended slapstick fight in the Charleston theater featuring the gang beating up clowns and acrobats. Naturaly this romp is accompanied by a very silly and old fashioned song meant to invoke the roaring twenties (and failing to do so). But these clowns have absolutely nothing to do with anything else in the picture! Herbert Lom is waisted (refusing to do his trademark eye twitch), James Coco is seen wearing only swimming trunks several times (a crowd pleaser for sure) and Bud Spencer only joins in the fight for a couple of of his trademark smacks before he gets back to smoking cigars and signing documents. When I really started to loose interest, I began checking all the mirrors in the hotel room scenes (there are plenty) to see if none of the crew members or equipment were reflected. To my everlasting surprise, they were not.
2 out of 10
