OSS 117: Alerte rouge en Afrique noire

It's not awful and it can extract 2 or 3 smiles.

But what a difference with the first two installments. The wit is lost. It's often boring and most jokes fall flat.

5 is a generous rating.

As always Hubert is very funny.

However if you except Jean Dujardin all the other characters are grotesque.

For the first time the country and the epoque are not really at the center of the story.

Here you are just following the mains characters in their adventure.

In short I would say it was fun to watch but no more...

I expected worse given the reviews I had read.

It's ok, but the script and writing simply aren't good. Mini OSS was obnoxious, poorly written character. The cast generally performs well, but there simply isn't much to go with. It's very linear, it's bland, there is no chemistry, some nice ideas but poorly utilized.

Some of the CGI is crap, but that wouldn't have saved the movie anyway.

Underwhelming overall.

Now I could be referring to Bond and OSS117 or I could be referring to the new member of the OSS team (1001). Or maybe both of course. But let's be clear, this movie does not care if you are offended - something that I would like to believe the Bond movie would not agree with. They tried to let the character grow - for better or worse. And whether the viewers liked what they saw or they didn't.

OSS on the other hand - he remains ignorant, sexist and racist. And yet Jean Dujardin fills the role with such an amazing performance and charisma, you kind of feel for the guy. Even when he says the most horrible and cringe worthy things - and believe he says quite a lot of those. You will not find just a few reasons to be offended here.

Apart from immature jokes, there are some political jokes too though. The role of France as colonials, but also Politicians of the 80s and communism ... you may not feel that they did the best job in handling certain themes, but you at least might want to give the movie kudos for even tackling them ... and while it does not reach the heights of the first two movies (it's been 12 years already since Part 2 came out?), it still is more than a solid movie right here. Still haven't watched the older OSS movies ... gotta push them up my watch list.

Imagine an aging French James Bond in 1981 sent to Africa on a mission and told not to appear either racist or misogynistic. This is the resulting film. Very enjoyable, as long as you understand the underlying humour and political situation - and, of course, performed brilliantly by Oscar-winning Jean Dujardin. The negative reviewers seem to misunderstand the underlying story and the background with which the film-makers have brilliantly dealt. It is not as laugh-a-minute as the original two films, but this is an OSS117 who is several years older and trying to cope with his decline in functions. I actually prefer this film to the original two - it is more developed upon the changing life of the main character - and it is still funny too!