Charlie Mortdecai (Johnny Depp) is a character that will be studied for a long, long time. His every move, however minimal, will the analysed; from the way he delivers the dialogue, to even the way he breathes and traverses the space around him. Every machination to his existence will be under the microscope. Why, I hear you ask?
Because Charlie Mortdecai is the definition of anti-comedy.
Everything he does is so disastrously unfunny that it’s actually, in a way, fascinating. His character has absolutely no redeeming qualities of any kind and is essentially skin deep; he is nothing but a moustache and a horrendously over-boiled accent that grates on you more than a, er, cheese grater. He’s also so zany and so off the wall that it becomes irritating – a quality that Johnny Depp was remarkably good at fails miserably here, to the point that you wish the hitmen in the opening scene had actually followed through with their threat to save the rest of the movie from ever happening.
Anyway, the rest of it – Mortdecai tells the story of Charlie Mortdecai, an English arts dealer who does a bit of black market naughtiness as and when it suits him. He is married to Joanna (Gwyneth Paltrow), who gags at his moustache and is mostly there for that sole purpose, and as a quasi-love interest. A woman is restoring a painting but gets shot while doing so, and Inspector Martland (Ewan McGregor) wants to know why – he enlists the help of Mortdecai and his manservant Jock Strapp (Paul Bettany) to track the painting down. There’s also some stuff about Russian gangsters that crops up occasionally too. That’s about it, really – the rest of it is just excuses for Mortdecai to turn up somewhere, dick about and then leave again.
It’s very rare that I see a film and not laugh once, but this makes an exception. Through its writing that is trying to hard to pick up an “ooh matron!” vibe, it tries so so hard but the jokes and innuendo (which normally I find quite amusing) just fall to the floor like a sack of unfunny potatoes. It wasn’t just me either – the screen I was in was half full (feeling optimistic, clearly) and I think there would have been more laughs if we were just shown a live feed of a drain for 90 minutes. Johnny Depp is by far the worse offender here, but the others too just aren’t funny at all – which it pains me to say as I actually quite like all the actors in it, ordinarily.
Mortdecai ultimately is a black hole of comedy, joy and entertainment. It sucks it all out of you like a big Dementor’s kiss from the screen and leaves you desperate for it to be over so you can leave and forget any of it ever happened – and I’m sure that everybody involved with the movie feels exactly the same way…
Richards Reckons 