First Posted: 1/27/2015
The Story
“Don’t point that thing at me!” says Johanna (Gwyneth Paltrow). She’s talking about her husband, Charlie Mortdecai’s (Johnny Depp) astonishing, Hercule-Poirot mustache. No one in this arch comedy likes it — except Charlie. “It looks like something curled up on your lip and died,” says quite elderly Sir Graham (Michael Culkin). “Go stuff a mattress with that thing!” says Johanna.
Can art dealer Mortdecai find Goya’s stolen masterpiece, “The Duchess of Wellington”? How much is it worth? Is a secret Nazi bank account code on the painting’s back? Will Charlie find it? Does he get the money? Answers in “Mortdecai,” a silly, foppish mystery-comedy.
The Actors
Johnny Depp — like others in this over-the-top comedy — has more fun on screen than most of us in the audience. He’s Charlie Mortdecai, broke aristocratic art dealer, specializing in stolen and, sometimes, fake art. He’s sexually frustrated because Johanna, his wife, a mostly one-note character, played by elegant Gwyneth Paltrow, retches whenever her lips touch his mustache. It’s a running gag in “Mortdecai.” One, alas, of many.
Others in the cast include Paul Bettany, Depp’s man-servant Jock, a sexual athlete, and Ewan McGregor, Mi-5 agent Alastair Martland — once, and still — in love with Johanna. “What is that infernal thing on your lip?” he says to Charlie. Michael Culkin is quirky exhibitionist Sir Graham, Paul Whitehouse is language-challenged Spinoza and, as Kampf, American art collector and Georgina, nymphomaniac daughter, Jeff Goldblum and Olivia Munn.
Other Comments
“Mortdecai” is a mystery-action-comedy that never quite finds what it wants to be: heist-flick in the tradition of “The Ladykillers” (1955), “Topkapi” (1964), “The Thomas Crowne Affair” (1968), outrageous send-up of the genre, or vanity project for Depp and colleagues. David Koepp directed, from a script by Eric Aronson, based on Kyril Bonfiglioli’s novel “The Great Mortdecai Mustache Mystery.” I’m a Johnny Depp fan, so I wanted it to be better but, as critic Roger Moore says, it’s “a watchable mess.” Pleasures include its frantic pace, camera work, smart cast, and nice production values. And the language: “My husband is trying to regain his youth with that dreadful mustache,” Johanna says. “It’s unbearable.” Depp does look like young Peter O’Toole in “Lawrence of Arabia” (1962).
Rated R for language and sex, it runs 106 minutes, but seems longer. You could wait for the DVD and not miss much.
Final Words
Depp is Lord “Mortdecai,”
Upper-class English twit —
Tracking stolen paintings,
With silly, foppish wit.
