Rent A Fish Called Wanda (1988)

A Joyous British Comedy - A Fish Called Wanda review by GI

With it's influences firmly rooted in the British comedy greats from the Ealing Comedies to the Carry Ons this remains a joy. It's a pacy, romantic crime caper that rattles along from the start and is superbly scripted by star (and uncredited co-director), John Cleese. Cleese has that unique gift of identifying human absurdity especially in character form and here he uses the extremes of difference between English traits and American traits to create a wonderful and very funny film. There are a couple of missteps not least the small homophobic scenes which even in 1988 jarred a little and the final ending is a little too contrived and borders on silly including the pointless pre credits information on the characters. But reappraising this today it remains a delight and it's arguably Jamie Lee Curtis' best film certainly within comedy and Kevin Kline has never been better (he deserved his Oscar for this). The story wastes no time in getting going and introduces the four main characters. In short this is about a gang who carry out a big London diamond heist. Two of them Wanda (Curtis) and Otto (Kline) intend to double cross their English colleagues but the situation comedy kicks in when the loot is hidden where they can't find it. Wanda decides to seduce the barrister Archie (Cleese) who is likely to know where the diamonds are leading to uncontrolled jealousy by the psychopathic Otto. This causes some wonderful comedy scenes often expressed by highlighting social and cultural differences. The film has real panache and everyone is clearly having a ball. Michael Palin is especially good as the repressed gang member Ken who has a stutter that plays into the plot and I have to mention Maria Aitken as Archie's terrifying wife, she really nails the tired old married woman character brilliantly. A clever, glorious contemporary and quintessentially British comedy that brings in modern themes yet retains the majesty of bygone films and it was the last film directed by veteran Ealing Comedy great, Charles Crichton.