sanat

This film typifies what one might call Hollywood's approach to a smart film. The smartness, such as it is, consists mainly of a self-aware narrator, and what one could call 'reality-style' violence for lack of a better term. The film is funny, but this is the humour of deliberate rudeness. The dialogue is lively, but primarily because the writers did not attempt to 'tone it down' to suit what they would call a mid-western audience.

Apart from that, there isn't much to recommend the film. The acting is all right, as is the cinematography and direction. Nothing stands out really. Best watched in the company of friends, and best forgotten immediately. If you follow the plot carefully you are likely to find strange bits. There isn't much of a story line, and there is the usual 'smart Hollywood film''s attempt at creating mystery by withholding information and obfuscation.

If you hope to watch something that will be worth remembering, avoid. If you just want a few beery laughs with mates, go ahead.

The Andy Griffith show is one of the best television programmes I have seen. It presents a very gentle, humorous look on small-town America, that hasn't been equalled.

The earlier episodes are better than the later ones. I suppose the transition point is when they went from being in black-and-white to colour. Unlike Guareschi's books, the good sheriff does not have a Peppone to ply his wits against, though Barney Fife comes pretty close sometimes, albeit unwittingly.

The episodes are done with great sensitivity and betray a great acumen in human character. It is unfortunate that such programming is no longer produced in America---it cannot be because of a lack of talent.

The Andy Griffith show demonstrates that human nature is essentially the same. Not only is Mayberry amazingly similar to Don Camillo's village, but people have the same kind of obsessions, desires and fears everywhere. This is truly an American classic, and one wishes that it were better known to foreign audiences.

The most jarring aspect of this series is John Cleese's Basil Fawlty. Cleese has made a career out of playing overwrought characters, whose behaviour is weird bordering on the bizarre. Apart from demonstrating a this very narrow repertoire, it often spoils---as in this case---what would otherwise have been an enjoyable programme.

It has been suggested that Basil Fawlty is based on John Fothergill. They couldn't be more different. Fothergill might have been direct to the point of being rude to his customers, but he was no Basil Fawlty. He was a Bourgeois who was trying to make something out of the ramshackle pub he had landed himself with, and eventually succeeded, primarily by never compromising either on the quality of his service or on his expectations from his guests.

Basil Fawlty on the other hand is the usual kind of grovelling inn keeper, with a tendency to behave like a lunatic. He is funny inasmuch as watching someone deranged is funny. What is extremely difficult to accept is that Sybil doesn't get rid of him. There are other weak points in the plot such as Polly's going along with all of Basil's silliness. She is too sober. All these are incongruities because the other characters are too sane to be living with Basil Fawlty. One could argue that that is the whole point. I would argue that the point is that John Cleese can only play Basil Fawlty types.

To sum up, the series suffers from the brand of surrealist randomness that one finds in Monty Python. Weirdness for the sake of weirdness might have been a '60s style rebellious statement, but is very tiresome actually. Someone should have given John Cleese a jolly good shake years and years ago, when he was less fat, but it's too late now.