Alan Arkin playing Clouseau would have to rank as one of the most awful casting choices ever made. (Will Smith as Mohammed Ali? Close. Di Crapio as a tough guy in 19th-century New York? Very close.) Arkin has never played clowns, nor is he one. He is far too cynical-looking for this type of role. Watching him say his lines was an exercise in embarrassment and major cringing. I suppose that die-hard PP fans who have nothing better to do can have endless discussions as to who was worse: Martin or Arkin. Maybe it'll take another 40 years for someone to attempt to make a PP movie without Sellers. What with the direction Hollywood is heading towards in recent years, it'll be someone like David Arquette's son who'll be cast to play the goofy Frenchman...
One person here wrote that one should forget about Peter Sellers and watch this movie on its own merits. Maybe he/she can do that, probably with some help from hallucinogenic drugs, but personally I'd find that a task both impossible and stupid. The fact is that Sellers DID do Panther earlier and was about 1000 times better.
Arkin is terminally unfunny with the sight gags, but it's the dialogue that really exposes his miscasting: there isn't a single line he says that is even remotely funny.
In all fairness, though, the script is garbage. The story has no flow, just a bunch of barely connected scenes strung together, the gags being rare and rather pathetic. The only thing the movie has going for it are the high production values, which make it watchable, if nothing else.
