What a demonstration of Fry's weaknesses as a writer: the quasi-Evelyn Waugh story; the undergraduate reflections on life and love; the vulgarity to shock and seek a laugh. The terrible news is that this is not funny at all, not even wrily in and English with a gin and tonic bone-dry drollness funny: in fact, it's witless and boring.
But it's worse than that: it is a lousy pastiche of a third rate 1930s novel written by some forgotten hack who went to a minor public school and then never published another book. Hence the cheap and common jibes about writing and publishing, mostly true too, but nonetheless dull as the proverbial ditch water to hear served up again.
The film adds a voice over to give the audience the musings and assorted drunken drivel from the author protagonist, who is a crumpled forgettable middle-aged man of no discernible attributes.
The plot tests the audiences' patience and good humor with its series of jokes about emissions deliberately designed to upset sensitive aunties. It wastes the talents of all involved and must be considered an elaborate tax avoidance scheme conceived in order to lose money.
But it's worse than that: it is a lousy pastiche of a third rate 1930s novel written by some forgotten hack who went to a minor public school and then never published another book. Hence the cheap and common jibes about writing and publishing, mostly true too, but nonetheless dull as the proverbial ditch water to hear served up again.
The film adds a voice over to give the audience the musings and assorted drunken drivel from the author protagonist, who is a crumpled forgettable middle-aged man of no discernible attributes.
The plot tests the audiences' patience and good humor with its series of jokes about emissions deliberately designed to upset sensitive aunties. It wastes the talents of all involved and must be considered an elaborate tax avoidance scheme conceived in order to lose money.