I'll be honest, this isn't a film I had in my sights, having never really watched any of Sacha Baron Cohen's previous films, but I was offered a chance to see it, and I can't pass up a chance to watch a free movie, so here we go.
This film has a very perfect opening, with a tasteless and actually very funny introduction to Nobby, and a very well done introduction to his brother Graives, in possibly the most badass action sequence in the film, it's fast, it's violent, and I really liked it. spearheading this film's list of characters is Sacha Baron Cohen's Nobby and Mark Strong's Graives, who are easily the film's 2 biggest high points, Graives is a badass, as evident from the first 10 minutes of the film, and while he's the more serious of the 2, he does provide some very funny moments throughout the film. Nobby on the other hand, is hysterically funny, when he's funny that is, and that can really be said of the film as a whole, when it's funny, it is side splittingly funny, but there's a lot of times when the tasteless and crude attempts at comedy just don't land, more on that later though. The film doesn't really have a villain as such, Penelope Cruz's character is just sort of thrown in towards the end of the film as the big baddie, but for the most part doesn't really do much, and she isn't very memorable, she wasn't funny, and as a result she really doesn't leave much of an impression. the film's various supporting characters are as serviceable as you'd expect, Ian McShane, Rebel Wilson and Isla Fisher are all fine when they're on screen, but Like Cruz, don't leave much of an impression, and are ultimately forgettable. it's not really a character but it might as well be, Grimsby and it's natives are really funny in this film, I've never been to Grimsby, so I don't know how accurate this interpretation is, but it's a really, shall we say, lovely interpretation, and it's satirical approach to both Grimsby and it's natives make for some big laughs, in my opinion. from a story stand point the film isn't much to write home about, with a completely acceptable spy story with false accusations, betrayals and deadly viruses, and a decent amount of action thrown in on top, including the already mentioned opening action sequence, and a few fun action sequences thrown here and there. Where the film falters is in a few ways I've already mentioned, for starters it's villain isn't very good, and while it's supporting cast are better, they too aren't particularly great. but the biggest failing of the film is when the jokes aren't funny, which happens fairly often, the tasteless jokes are very hit and miss, either being hilarious or just cringe worthy, and the attempts at smarter comedy are also hit and miss, but with a slightly higher success rate. for every brief burst of extremely funny shit, there's a long period of mere occasional chuckles, and they take the film down a few pegs. it's good then that the parts of the film that are funny are very, very funny; for example a scene with a poison dart, and another with an elephant, which might have given me a phobia of elephants, in addition to being the most vulgar and vile thing I've seen in a long time, it was actually really funny.
All in All Grimsby is a film I enjoyed, it's got a pair of funny leads, a serviceable supporting line up and spy story, but a very lacklustre villain, it's got some really fun action and some painfully funny parts, but for all of that, there are times when this film doesn't work, or when the vulgarity just doesn't translate to laughs, it's no Deadpool, I'll say that. this is still a film I'd recommend, but I wouldn't call it a film that must be seen, 6 months from now my Blu Ray collection won't be including Grimsby, but it's not a bad film.
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