Hôtel Paradiso, une maison sérieuse

As someone who has thoroughly enjoyed "Bottom" on the TV I was hoping that the 2 lads would be able to maintain their style on film and benefit from the larger budget. I really don't think they wholly succeeded.

One of the early scenes with Eddie on a motorbike would've been handled with chroma-key green screen on video with a chaotic speeded up background and hilarious results. Here they virtually do the stunt for real at higher cost but with rather less effect.

In this film you can tell that instead of the economically efficient multicamera set-up they used at the BBC, one camera was used throughout with the resulting pressure on the acting talents of the 2 leads. With the best will in the world these guys are more used to a theatre style of physical comedy and their, and possibly more Ade Edmundson's, inexperience shows.

Ade Edmundson directed and for one reason or another Rik Mayall has well over 70% of the screen time. Which is not a bad thing. In addition Edmundson bravely goes nude in one scene - something never seen on the TV show. So I really think they were giving the film their best shot without concern for their own egos.

As usual the supporting characters are played as normal human beings accidentally walking into the madness but Simon Pegg, who we all now know to be no small comedy talent himself, is a little off putting in retrospect as I couldn't help but expect him to have some laughs of his own rather than play victim throughout.

One portion of the film intercuts a Richie and Eddie scene with what appears to be the rape of the main female character. This was rather disconcerting to me even when I knew full well that the bad-guy is going to come to a sticky end.

So over all there are several short-comings but for Bottom fans the film should be seen and not avoided as most reviews say.

i had been looking for this film for so long before i found it, i had seen it when i was younger and loved it, after my second viewing i still loved it and i still do.

this is a love/hate film, if you like bottom, young ones, the comic strip, then you will find this funny. If you don't like that kind of humour then don't bother. I love this film and have grown up with these comedy programmes, for me this film is simply placing their comic genius on the big screen.. It is not an award winner by any means but if you just want good wholesome slapstick then this is it!

the film lacks the quality of the TV series and this is usually the case with films but it still has enough material to keep you laughing even if a lot of the jokes are pretty similar to their previous work.

yes, the humour is a little childish and not to everyone's taste but sometimes you just need that in a film.

I saw this when it first came out, and found it to be a work of some genius; but I must confess I was clearly in the minority at the time.

For me, the progressive lunacy of the proprietors of Guest House Paradiso just gets better and better throughout the film, with one of the most hilarious climaxes to a film ever.

But I wouldn't recommend it to Mother.

Lovers of gross-out comic book style humour will appreciate this movie; there are subtle jokes hidden away, but they are usually quickly flattened by a comedy frying pan. Rik Mayall and Ade Edmondson are superb, and the deadpan, unsuspecting guests are also excellent.

Guest House Paradiso is Rik's and Ade's finest hour, given the big screen treatment it is way better than Bottom. I really do not understand why this film has such bad press is it Rik's reputation and his love hate relationship with the tabloids? The manic cartoonish violence, the bottom/toilet humour and schoolboy jokes are not everyone's cup of tea but Ade and Rik as their characters in the TV show are, are purposely absurd and unsophisticated characters, this is why internationally they are immediately recognisable and loved. Mayall and Edmondson do their best to craft a wonderfully crude film with humour that will be understood in ever country on the planet, if this is what they set out to do, to make an international popular hit, they succeeded hands down. So in my humble opinion this Guest House Paradiso is a stonking success and their finest hour.

I've always liked to think of myself as an intelligent and sophisticated viewer of both movies and television. I've always prided myself on appreciating films with strong, uncompromising stories. I know what David Lynch is going on about, okay?

The only trouble is that, for some bizarre reason, the sight of Rik Mayall pretending to kick Adrian Edmondson in the groin (accompanied by an over the top crunching sound effect) never, ever fails to make me laugh like an idiot who's just seen an ex-Doctor Who slip over on a banana skin.

So excited was I at Richie and Eddie's leap to the celluloid fantasy of the big screen ('ere, 'ark at 'im) that I arrived an hour and five minutes early. I'd been waiting for the film ever since the first rumours about a year and a half before hand.

With such a build up, how could it leave up to my expectations? Well, I don't know, but it did.

Hysterical laughter ensued right from the off (that's right, I even laughed at the close up of Richie sleeping that starts the film) and didn't stop for, ooh, some time (half way through the ending titles, I think).

As movie sandwiches go, this one had a good spread, but had some very good chunks added to the mixture. Amongst the best were Richie's hysterical laughter/wince inducing 'Candle in the eye' and the scene with Simon Pegg's nipple ring that got a truly amazing reaction from a woman sat near me.

So, I loved it. True, not everybody finds somebody getting a fire extinguisher in the face, or getting trapped in an oven, or all of the other really painful goings on funny, but we don't talk about them.

Any problems? Well...it ended a bit suddenly. It took me a couple of seconds to realize the film was actually over. It did lack Rik and Ade's usual bitter nastiness - just look how many Bottom escapades ended with Richie and Eddie's untimely deaths.

Still, a good note to end on: It's bloody funny. No, bloody bloody funny.