Johnny English Reborn (2011)

Johnny English 2 is fantastic. I watched it before it came out and I have to say, once it comes out everyone MUST go see it. It is not a total slapstick, childishly funny comedy. I absolutely loved the first and the second one is a must see. Even my mother and wife absolutely loved it. Had us laughing the whole time. This is the movie I recommend to anyone just looking for a funny comedy that entertains everyone. It has a very simple easy to follow plot which makes it great for a children as well. There is no gore, or anything like that so even better for the kids. Rowan Atkinson have made a fun, entertaining film, barely missing the heights of the first adventure. Stay for the after credits scene! Rowan Atkinson never seems to disappoint.

Johnny English (Rowan Atkinson) returns from training in Tibet after his dismissal. Pegasus (Gillian Anderson) is the new boss of MI-7. Kate Sumner (Rosamund Pike) is the behavioral psychologist. Agent One Simon Ambrose (Dominic West) is still with the service. English is paired up with junior agent Colin Tucker to go to Hong Kong. Ex-CIA agent Titus Fisher (Richard Schiff) tells him about a secret group called Vortex who are looking to assassinate the Chinese Premier.I like the character more this time around. He starts off as a buffoon who knows he's a buffoon. The Tibet section is a great start. The movie has a few laughs spoofing James Bond. English is actually funnier if he's merely competent like when he recalls his Tibetan teachings to chase after the Parkour guy. It is hilarious because they're directly making fun of Bond. It's much funnier than simply being an idiot. The chase in HK is hilarious. It's too bad that the movie doesn't get back to that level of comedy.

Do yourselves a favor and trust me when I say you must avoid this film.When I see a film as bad as this one I despair of the film industry as a whole. I wonder how on earth anyone would finance such an unfunny, banal, formulaic, unoriginal and almost completely predictable (apart from keeping the token black actor alive) film, but then I remember that the British government has been giving huge tax breaks to encourage the film industry to invest into 'British' films. if this cow pat of a film is a typical result, then the British taxpayer has been robbed blind. This money ought to be paying for higher risk productions (i.e not based solely on getting financial reward) to engender new talent especially in writing and direction.One day I hope that cinema will start reaching the heights that currently only seem to be being reached on TV - watch Game of Thrones, quite superb!

The combination of high-tech thrillers a la James Bond and the so English humor of Rowan Atkinson worked fine for me in the original 'Johnny English' and work even better in the 'Johnny English Reborn' sequel released eight years later, which I got to see only now. If I am to look for the perfect comedy entertainment I would go for something like this because it succeeds to be funny and anti political-correct, while keeping some logic and sending references to the original movies it is inspired from, without taking itself too much seriously at any moment.If I am to decide what are the reasons JE works for me better than other similar comedy-parody movies I would of course first of all mention Rowan Atkinson. He is himself, meaning Mr. Bean whatever the role he plays - a combination of Britishness and irreverence, a walking gaffer and catastrophes generator, and yet - a warm human being. The greatest comical character one can identify with since Stan Laurel.The second reason are the scripts of the Johnny English films. They actually have logic. Of course, it's Brit logic, it's movies logic, but if you really put the script of the two Johnny English movies near the stories of most of the James Bond films, not only you will find them similar, but English may won many of the credibility contests.This second and I hope not last installment of Johnny English has also the great advantage to bring back to screen one of my mostly beloved actresses, Gillian Anderson of X-Files fame. Did I say that was my preferred TV-series of all times. I did and now you know it all too. I hope that director Oliver Parker (or somebody else) will go on with the JE series, and that Gillian will become Atkinson/English's Q for a long time.