'Alan Partridge: Alpha Papa' review by Captain Raptor
Knowing me, Captain Raptor, knowing you, Alan Partridge, aha. After putting chat among the pigeons and bringing quality broadcasting to the TV and the radio, Alan Partridge takes his first step into big school - the silver screen. TV characters moving to movies is nothing new, but can a littler-than-life character such as Alan be transferred successfully? Partridge has been consistently funny over the years, it's written by Armando Iannucci, who managed to put The Thick of It in cinemas effectively as In The Loop, and it's got the best title of any film this year, but I still had a few doubts.
The 90 minute runtime definitely makes the film seem stretched, but overall Alan Partridge translates well over to the big screen. Steve Coogan's performance is as fantastic as ever, and the large list of quotable lines courtesy of Alan Partridge grows even larger. The script is for the most part excellent, maybe suffering from necessary padding in the middle to extend the runtime, but is full of the mildly offensive and stupid non-sequiturs we've come to expect and a plot that excellently highlights the egotism and strange likeability of the character. One concern about adapting Partridge to film was that his previous escapades have all been very low-key and even minimalist, but Alpha Papa keeps this (to a lesser extent). There's no huge set-pieces, no litany of celebrity cameos and no exotic location. It's just one guy in a radio station. With a gun toting madman. Colm Meaney's performance as the radio DJ gone postal Pat Farrell is commendable for adding a fair degree of pathos and even drama without disrupting the flow of the film, and still acing the comedy scenes as the deadpan wall for Alan's jokes to bounce off. Further great reactionary support comes from Sidekick Simon (Tim Key), and recurring characters Lynn (Felicity Montagu) and Michael the Geordie (Simon Greenall) add some laughs of their own. Ultimately though, the film is all about Alan Partridge, and Coogan had me enthralled from start to finish with his now highly-polished act.
It's not all perfect - there's a boring love interest which never really makes an impact, and it does feel like putting such a great character in such an insane situation could be just a little funnier. Aside from this, there's very little not to like about Alpha Papa. The parodies of the action genre are funny, but there's also plenty of comedy to be found in its own right. It keeps the irreverent sense of humour and sprinkles some lightly larger and more farcical elements onto the mixture. It's the same type of jokes used in the old shows, which should please the fans, but there's enough that's fresh and more accessible that newcomers can enjoy this just as much as anybody else. The joke rate is high, so while there's only a couple of genuinely hilarious moments (most of which come through a truly brilliant scene in which Alan tries to evade Pat by running around and hiding on a pier), there's very rarely more than a twenty second gap between laughs.
Alan Partridge: Alpha Papa is a very funny film that should please longtime fans by managing to both keep the spirit of the previous shows and change enough that it's not an attempt to repeat past glories. Those unfamiliar with Steve Coogan's Norfolk people's hero may not completely warm to the movie, but there's definitely plenty there to keep them entertained. A good supporting cast, a fantastic script, and one hell of lead performance, Alpha Papa deserves to stand shoulder to shoulder with Knowing Me Knowing you et al.
The 90 minute runtime definitely makes the film seem stretched, but overall Alan Partridge translates well over to the big screen. Steve Coogan's performance is as fantastic as ever, and the large list of quotable lines courtesy of Alan Partridge grows even larger. The script is for the most part excellent, maybe suffering from necessary padding in the middle to extend the runtime, but is full of the mildly offensive and stupid non-sequiturs we've come to expect and a plot that excellently highlights the egotism and strange likeability of the character. One concern about adapting Partridge to film was that his previous escapades have all been very low-key and even minimalist, but Alpha Papa keeps this (to a lesser extent). There's no huge set-pieces, no litany of celebrity cameos and no exotic location. It's just one guy in a radio station. With a gun toting madman. Colm Meaney's performance as the radio DJ gone postal Pat Farrell is commendable for adding a fair degree of pathos and even drama without disrupting the flow of the film, and still acing the comedy scenes as the deadpan wall for Alan's jokes to bounce off. Further great reactionary support comes from Sidekick Simon (Tim Key), and recurring characters Lynn (Felicity Montagu) and Michael the Geordie (Simon Greenall) add some laughs of their own. Ultimately though, the film is all about Alan Partridge, and Coogan had me enthralled from start to finish with his now highly-polished act.
It's not all perfect - there's a boring love interest which never really makes an impact, and it does feel like putting such a great character in such an insane situation could be just a little funnier. Aside from this, there's very little not to like about Alpha Papa. The parodies of the action genre are funny, but there's also plenty of comedy to be found in its own right. It keeps the irreverent sense of humour and sprinkles some lightly larger and more farcical elements onto the mixture. It's the same type of jokes used in the old shows, which should please the fans, but there's enough that's fresh and more accessible that newcomers can enjoy this just as much as anybody else. The joke rate is high, so while there's only a couple of genuinely hilarious moments (most of which come through a truly brilliant scene in which Alan tries to evade Pat by running around and hiding on a pier), there's very rarely more than a twenty second gap between laughs.
Alan Partridge: Alpha Papa is a very funny film that should please longtime fans by managing to both keep the spirit of the previous shows and change enough that it's not an attempt to repeat past glories. Those unfamiliar with Steve Coogan's Norfolk people's hero may not completely warm to the movie, but there's definitely plenty there to keep them entertained. A good supporting cast, a fantastic script, and one hell of lead performance, Alpha Papa deserves to stand shoulder to shoulder with Knowing Me Knowing you et al.
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