Grimsby ** (2016, Sacha Baron Cohen, Mark Strong, Isla Fisher) – Movie Review

Sacha Baron Cohen puts the grim in Grimsby as his latest creation, the football obsessed, kebab-munching Nobby. Cohen and Mark Strong form a highly skilled comedy double act but the jokes are mean and offensive – and isn’t a spy comedy a bit lame as an idea?

Now, humour is very, very subjective. For example, the good people of Grimsby haven’t all seen the funny side of Sacha Baron Cohen taking the mickey out of their town and townsfolk. Even while it was being filmed, Grimsby upset irate local councillors (though obviously they hadn’t actually seen it!). Take another example, not everybody sees the funny side of Sacha Baron Cohen.

But then again, many people do. Last night, in a surprisingly sparsely attended preview screening, one or two people were clutching their sides in uncontrollable laughter, many others were laughing sporadically, and some others weren’t laughing at all.

Sacha Baron Cohen makes his living out of daring to tell dirty or outageous jokes and shocking people into nervous laughter. Fair enough, we can take it or leave it. The shock value here is fairly high, the star’s fans will be relieved to hear. Personally I can’t be doing with AIDS jokes, paedophile jokes, body fascism jokes (bald?, fat?, great let’s laugh at you) or gay-fear jokes. They are (1) not funny, (2) homophobic and (3) reactionary. Tick the box where it applies. Does Sacha Baron Cohen have any friends? Is he kind to animals?

The entire, suspiciously short film, just 80 minutes, almost totally motors on Sacha Baron Cohen’s gay bashing. It was Bette Midler who said ‘**** ’em if they can’t take a joke’ but she was joking about Jew-bashing neo Nazis and she’s totally gay friendly. Almost all the ‘jokes’ in Grimsby are of exactly the same kind, which makes them repetitive and boring, as well as offensive. Yes, yes, I know, they’re meant to be offensive. But that doesn’t make them inoffensive. Oh, and how many times are we going to see Cohen’s bare a***? It’s the same joke, Sacha.

I should point out, by the way, that disappointingly, hardly any of the film is set in Grimsby, bewilderingly. And that none of the scenes in Grimsby were shot there as they were filmed in Essex! I guess that’s the joke? Maybe because he doesn’t like people to say ‘no’, he never asked to film in Grimsby.

Cohen and Mark Strong have the entire movie to themselves. Strong is a very good actor indeed, in one way wasted on this kind of thing, but in another he is the film’s entire saving grace. He’s game for anything, and great at everything, as Grimsby football hooligan Nobby (Cohen)’s long-lost MI6 top assassin spy brother Sebastian, who reluctantly team ups with his idiot sibling to save the world from a lunatic who wants to unleash a killer virus at the 2016 soccer final.

Everybody else is really wasted – Penélope Cruz as the world health benefactor (apparently), Rebel Wilson as Nobby’s capacious, slobby girlfriend Lindsey, Ian McShane, Tamsin Egerton, Isla Fisher, Johnny Vegas, Gabourey Sidibe. They either have little, nothing or nothing good to do. Cruz’s agent needs to rethink her career – this is the second duff comedy he’s got her into this year (after Zoolander 2). Admittedly, though, it is admirable that Wilson is doing something that’s different from her Pitch Perfect 2 / How to Be Single turn.

And, to be fair, Cohen and Strong form a highly skilled comedy double act here. As for the film, I said it was short, and it is cut to the bone, fast moving and slick. Despite the lack of appeal beyond UK borders (they’ll never let a print out of the country!), I can see a sequel in the pipeline quite soon. Perhaps next time actually about Grimsby and entirely set there, and maybe even filmed there in the highly unlikely even of Cohen being welcomed.

On the other hand, if there’s is no such thing as bad publicity, Cohen’s film has done a fishing town in North East England the service of putting it on the map.

Have I been ranting? Well that’s all for now, folks, and again I think the best I can do is offer the Grimsby trailer as the best way to make your mind up whether the movie is for you or not. The trailer tells you what to expect but I should just add the movie’s a fraction better than the trailer suggests.

The Grimsby trailer. Click on Grimsby, right?!

© Derek Winnert 2016 Movie Review

Link to Derek Winnert’s home page for more reviews: http://derekwinnert.com/