Three stars. Rated R, and needless, for fleeting profanity and mild blue humor
By Derrick Bang
I’ve a soft spot for
light-hearted caper flicks, and a corresponding tendency to treat them gently, during
post-mortem analysis.
It’s therefore with great regret
that I pronounce Mortdecai a crushing
disappointment.
 |
| Intending to rig the art auction on which their fortunes now depend, Mortdecai (Johnny Depp) and his wife, Johanna (Gwyneth Paltrow) make a public appearance to allay suspicion. But will the hapless Mortdecai be able to orchestrate his end of this complex swindle? |
Although promoted as a caper
saga, that’s not quite accurate; the closest our title character gets to a
heist is climbing a ladder to enter a second-story window. And while the story
does revolve around a rumored Goya masterpiece enhanced by the possibility that
its canvas has been defaced with a code that might lead to long-lost Nazi gold,
Eric Aronson’s script dwells too heavily on Mortdecai himself.
Preening, foppish, self-centered
Charlie Mortdecai, played in full-blown, upper-class-twit mode by Johnny Depp.
Time was, a new Johnny Depp
project was cause for celebration; he brought such panache to most everything he did a decade or so ago, in
projects as diverse as Chocolat, From Hell, Finding Neverland and even the first Pirates of the Caribbean. More recently, though, his work has
tended toward self-indulgent laziness, with Depp apparently coasting on the
merits of his own career, and bringing little to each new party.
These days, in the wake of The Rum Diary, Dark Shadows and most particularly The Lone Ranger, we’re more inclined to roll our eyes at the
prospect of a new Depp feature ... much the way his Mortdecai sighs
theatrically and rolls his eyes at
just about everything here.
That’s the major problem with
director David Koepp’s approach; he and cinematographer Florian Hoffmeister
focus far too much on Depp. Granted, one expects a movie’s star to receive the
lion’s share of close-ups, but Depp’s slow, aristocratically condescending line
readings — although initially droll — become tiresome, and eventually bring the
otherwise fast-paced film to a grinding halt. Every. Time. He. Speaks.
Koepp is trying for a manic,
effervescent blend of P.G. Wodehouse and The
Pink Panther: a smart choice, since this film is inspired by the
charismatic, forever cash-strapped, art-dealer anti-hero in a series of three
comic novels by the late British author Kyril Bonfiglioli, and published back
in the 1970s. His Mortdecai clearly is based on Wodehouse’s Bertie Wooster, and
the resemblance is cemented further by Mortdecai’s far more capable manservant
Jock Strapp, an equally obvious nod to Bertie’s Jeeves.
Bonfiglioli’s Mortdecai books are
beloved by no less than Stephen Fry, who will be remembered as the pluperfect
Jeeves in the 1990 TV series he did with frequent colleague Hugh Laurie. And if
this film’s press notes are to be believed, Depp himself is another Bonfiglioli
fan. So far, so good.
