parole 3 Edition

reviewed The Parole Officer (PG) John Duigan hh Me, You, Them (PG) Andrucha Waddington hhhh Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within (PG) Hironobu Sakaguchi, Motonori Sakakibara hh Help! I'm A Fish (U) Michael Hegner hh Rush Hour 2 (12) Brett Ratner hh The first of three British comedy films this year...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inSunday herald (Glasgow, Scotland)
Main Author Steve Coogan is trying a big screen role in The Parole Officer, but Wendy Ide reckons he should save his talent for TV
Format Newspaper Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Glasgow (UK) Gannett Media Corp 05.08.2001
Subjects
Coogan, Steve
Duigan, John
Hegner, Michael
Partridge, Alan
Sakaguchi, Hironobu
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Summary:reviewed The Parole Officer (PG) John Duigan hh Me, You, Them (PG) Andrucha Waddington hhhh Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within (PG) Hironobu Sakaguchi, Motonori Sakakibara hh Help! I'm A Fish (U) Michael Hegner hh Rush Hour 2 (12) Brett Ratner hh The first of three British comedy films this year to be set in and around the prison service (the others, Lucky Break and Greenfingers, will hit the cinemas within a couple of months), The Parole Officer sees comedian Steve Coogan try to shake off the persistent odour of TV that clings to him like stale cigarette smoke. He's only partly successful in this aim - he has at least chosen to create a new character for his big screen debut, rather than dragging out one of his TV stalwarts and leaving them to founder in a thin narrative stretched over a feature-length format. But Coogan's socially inept, highly irritating Parole Officer character, Simon Garden, is still a recognisable relative of Alan Partridge, or perhaps both Simon and Alan have elements of Coogan's own personality (although you would hope not). This familiarity will both work in the film's favour and against - Coogan's substantial TV following is more than likely to flock to see the movie on the strength of his name alone. But the inimitable Cooganism of the performance means that the finished film seems less a film and more a vehicle for a television personality.