Blame It on the Bellboy

Short fun in a classic mixup farce format. Bryan Brown, Richard Griffiths, and Dudley Moore all converge on Venice for an assignation. The linguistically challenged bellboy (Bronson Pinchot) mixes up the messages they're to receive. And we're off.

Andreas Katsulas and his crew are excellent and perhaps the comedic high point. Patsy Kensit is always there to feast your eyes on. Alison Steadman is great in her supporting role.

It's interesting how Merk Herman 'weaves' the three story lines together - and it's not just editing. It's a cute touch.

And of course there is 'Venezia' in one of the leading roles as well. It's one hour twenty eight minutes only but it's fun.

This comedy film is better than most, even though it wasn't successful and the critics hated it.

It's set in Venice and involves farcical mix-ups that are caused by three very different men being confused with each other - because their surnames sound similar and they have the same initial.

Why did this receive such a low rating? This is a delightfully funny farce that had me on the floor. It's so hilarious! It goes through with its intention of being a fast-paced, old-fashioned farce mixed with the good ol' comedy of errors. The cast is superb. I only wish Dudley Moore could've been given a funnier part - this is definitely one of his more thankless roles. Unfortunately, this was one of his last roles, if not the last. But he was still an incredible comic actor and he will surely be missed. Richard Griffiths, who I remember as the cripple in "Naked Gun 2 1/2," is extremely funny. Bryan Brown plays it straight as a bewildered hitman, and does a fantastic job. I also liked that woman who played his eventual love interest - she has some very funny scenes. And man-oh-man is Patsy Kensit a hottie or what?!!!

The script is contrived and most of the gags are forced, but I give the writer/director an "E" for effort. It's hard to pull off a wacky farce like this with great precision. It was done excellently in "Ruthless People," but not every farce can be like "Ruthless People." I said it before and I'll say it again, the sense of humor don't lie. If I'm roaring with laughter, obviously the film did its job. And I was roaring all right!

My score: 7 (out of 10)

It didn't feel like that at the time but 1992 was now thirty years ago. The fact that Dudley Moore has been dead for over twenty years, the size of his TV remote and Trevor Jones' tiresome trumpet score all attest to that fact.

This represented the final whimper of Moore's film career as a variety of characters engage in an extremely unfunny chase around Venice. The plot is one of those stupid farces based on misunderstandings; in the title role Bronson Pinchot is as amusing as ringworm, but at least the cast and crew got an expenses paid holiday in sunny Italy.

Moore is almost invisible in his own film, the best performance easily being given by Penelope Wilton as a lonelyheart who reads Mickey Spillane, lets her hair down, discovers an affinity with firearms and helps Bryan Brown realise his ambition of settling down and opening a flower shop in Huddersfield. The scenes early on (SLIGHT SPOILER COMING:) were he accidentally shoots two local birds while trying to take out Ms Wilton earns the film an extra point.

Take 3 Englishmen -

1. Michael Horton (a philanderer indulging in a surreptitious tryst) 2. Mike Lawton (a hit man assigned to rub out an Italian mob boss) 3. Melvin Orton (a mousey junior manager on a property-buying assignment for his overbearing boss)

and put them all in the same Venetian hotel with a bellhop who has great difficulty with the English language, and you have what promises to be a raucously funny good time, and 'Blame it on the Bellboy' delivers on the promise. This rousing comedy of confused identities comes right out of the tradition of the great British Ealing Studios film comedies of the late 50's and 60's (the same tradition 'A Fish Called Wanda' purported to come from; I found this movie a LOT funnier).

My only complaint is that some of the grim scenes of mob violence would be more at home in the 'Lethal Weapon' series; in a farce like this they seem jarringly out of place. However, beautiful Patsy Kensit's presence more than compensates for this minor complaint (she was the blonde secretary in Lethal Weapon 2, remember?).

On the whole, an A++ recommendation