The Trip to Italy

The Trip to Italy is a sequel to the little known, little seen 2010 film The Trip, which in itself is a highlight reel of a little known, little seen BBC miniseries of the same name. Each reiteration of this franchise, I guess you could call it, feels like the rotating lenses of a microscope, filling in more detail while getting ever smaller in scope and appeal. Who exactly is this movie for? I'm not quite sure but whoever is on its wavelength will probably have a ball.

The Trip to Italy revisits Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon as they are once again conscripted by the London Observer to eat at and review multiple restaurants. This time instead of driving through the foggy moors of Northern England, the duo drive their rented Mini Cooper through the sunny coasts of Italy. While doing so they once again trade witty repartee, relight professional rivalries and whip out their best Michael Caine impressions.

Its basically the same setup as the first only the location and power dynamic between our two leads is a bit more interesting. Coogan's star seems to have taken a dip since the cancellation of his American TV series. Meanwhile the less misanthropic Brydon is being courted by director Michael Mann for a billed part in a crime drama. Insecurities and the specter of aging into obsolescence abounds in this sequel, and the Italian countryside and tales of the Romantics serve beautifully as a stark juxtaposition.

Director Michael Winterbottom takes every opportunity to indulge in the sun and scenic poetry of Italy. As the characters retrace the steps of the romantics, Winterbottom takes delight in lifting visual cues from mainstay international cinema such as the bumpy road trips of Il Sorpasso (1962), the luxurious schooners of Purple Noon (1960) and the general feeling of ennui from La Dolce Vita (1960). As the film wears on, the actors become entrenched in a background literally alive with history, unable to make their pithy comments take you out of the beauty (though it's not for lack of trying.

Yet the same things that bogged down The Trip from being the best version of itself are still purposely present in Trip to Italy. There are the same insufferably self-centered characters, the same conversations and improvisational impressions, the same inattention to the freaking food! Seriously, I realize that oafish behavior set against the truly beautiful is partially the point but how do you NOT make Italian food the center of attention? Thankfully the two surly actors have much more to interact with. Actresses Marta Barrio and Rosie Fellner actually show up to dinner instead of being relegated to bits of cellphone asides. Steve's son (as played by Timothy Leach) shows up as well allowing us to see how two middle-aged men in a perpetual existential crises handle being around a child for a few minutes.

Overall Trip to Italy is in my mind a smidgen better than its predecessor and only because it trades temperate gloom for Mediterranean sunniness. But if you're the type who finds the fields, fog and verdant bluffs of England more appealing then the opposite might be true for you. Regardless, your ability to take this trilogy (so far) is wholly dependent on your ability to stomach two actors winging-it while sitting across from one another. I personally found my patience eroding by the minute.

If anybody is familiar with either of this pair, The Trip To Italy is really a must see series/film. The first instalment from these two, The Trip, which was set in the Lake District was initially a series & then released widely as a film. This new version is much of the same, and as the title suggests, yes you've guessed it, sees this clever duo wining & dining in some great Italian locations. The series is very easy to watch, clever, witty, and with superb impressions, but most of all the on screen chemistry this pair have is what makes the show. They bounce off each other perfectly, & in terms of great on screen pairings, they are right up there with some of the best. I honestly can't recommend this enough, i have scored it a nine, simply because i have only watched the opening two episodes, but if it carries on in the same form, it will be getting a big fat Ten !!

Top Class Telly.

I was hesitant taking another trip w/ Steve and Rob in that I so much loved the first film and thought this film might be a letdown and was never going to expectations set by the first film. No need for worries, this film was just as good, just as funny and better still, both Steve and Rob have remained (aside from Coogan's haircut) them old selves, changing little from when we left them in Northern England, a perfect mixture of affability and arrogance, quick witted, sometimes to the point of absurdity, sprinkled with a tinge of melancholy.

If you love British humour, travel & beautiful scenery, fine food, movies, literature and poetry, and beautiful women......(pretty much all things worth living for)... than this is the movie to watch.

Steve: (looking at a beautiful hotel receptionist walking past) She's has a lovely gait.

Rob: Yes, probably padlocked.

Hilarious!

Not very familiar with the actors, I enjoyed some of the conversations although the imitations do start to get annoying halfway the movie. You can see they are great actors but you do feel the script pouring through lots of the time... It has to look like 2 friends getting together having funny conversations but it just doesn't work. Plus I got very annoyed with the maffia/Al Pacino/Marlon Brando imitations, it was just too easy. Overall it felt more like Michael Winterbottom has started his midlife crisis and uses the actors, the script and Italy to get to the (michaelwinter)bottom of it. A pointless one night stand, 2 older English guys "trying" to be funny, beautiful scenery, it just breathed midlife crisis everywhere. I just found it too easy, he could have made something better honestly, maybe put in a weird end with someone dying or something a bit more shocking.. now its just a small river of sometimes funny conversations between two 40something English guys who still want to shag all young, beautiful girls, and who do feel more male when they succeed in this, while they get drunk on gin and tonics... It looks like Michael Winterbottom went to Italy himself, red some Lord Byron and Don Juan, felt himself a bit like Woody Allen and combined this with his upcoming midlife crisis and this was what came out.....The scenery is beautiful though and you will crave for a fab pasta just because of the food shots.

As with their first "The Trip", I've had ambivalent feelings about these Coogan/Brydon travel/food/comedy serials. This new series follows much of the first.

If you loved the first, that's good news. But the program is a mixed bag to where you really have to call out the good and the bad.

First, the good. Coogan and Brydon have a great personal chemistry that comes off in the series as something unscripted. The locations are gorgeous, and the soundtrack adds to the grandeur of place. The series is also somewhat groundbreaking in introducing a genre of travel-food- comedy, which has its merits.

The restaurants featured in the series are researched and quite extraordinary. And the literary trail of the likes of Byron and Shelley add a cultural relevance to the program where, I would have to say, I would enjoy partaking in such a Magical Mystery Tour myself.

Next, the bad. If you removed the impersonations of Michael Caine, Sean Connery, etc., 70% of the program would be on the cutting room floor. There are few themes of humor in the program, and they are mercilessly beaten to an absolute pulp. Can you imagine spending a week-long vacation in Italy with a friend who basically ran the same gag everywhere you went?

This makes the program the Beavis & Butthead of the BBC set. If the gag gets old or doesn't work for you, the show has little else to offer you besides a few good visual scenes with the sound turned off.

Like the Magical Mystery Tour, the show's arc comes off as rather aimless and without a real destination. If the joy is in the travel, and some of it is, that would be one thing. But if there's no joy in bad impersonation banter of actors from years gone by, there's too much to redeem itself.

As a whole, the program offers glimpses of creative ideas and possibilities while failing to execute to their potential. Injecting an actual scriptwriter might have seemed anathema to the program's vision and goals, but there are few programs I've seen this year that so sorely could have improved with just one decent writer.