• Rating:
• Genre: Comedy
• Movie Type: Slapstick, Screwball Comedy
• Themes: Nothing Goes Right, Assumed Identities, Unlikely Heroes
• Director: Mel Smith
• Main Cast: Rowan Atkinson, Peter MacNicol, Pamela Reed, Harris Yulin, Burt Reynolds
• Release Year: 1997
• Country: UK
• Run Time: 90 minutes
• MPAA Rating: PG13

Plot

Comic actor Rowan Atkinson brought his bumbling character Mr. Bean from television to the big screen with this British comedy. Mr. Bean (Rowan Atkinson) is a well-meaning but not especially bright fellow with a gift for making the worst of any situation. Bean is about to be fired from his job as a guard at the Royal Nation Art Gallery for sleeping on the job, but the Chairman (John Mills) intervenes at the last moment. To insure that his incompetence will manifest itself so completely that there will be no choice but to get rid of him, Bean's superiors come up with a plan -- they'll send him to America to speak at a posh private gallery owned by George Grierson (Harris Yulin), where General Newton (Burt Reynolds) will display the most recent addition to his art collection, "Whistler's Mother." It's even money whether or not the museum will still be standing before Bean is done; as if this weren't enough, while in L.A. Bean is mistaken for a surgeon and forced to operate on an injured police officer. Richard Curtis, one of the film's producers, said after viewing the final product, "It's an unpleasant family movie. I'm very pleased." ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Review

A monster hit internationally, this comedy showcases the physically expressive talents of actor Rowan Atkinson, who provides a few major laughs in elaborate slapstick sequences, some of them cribbed wholesale from his winning British TV series featuring the same character. Atkinson is a comic gem, a throwback to an earlier era of silent screen legends such as Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton, and his gifts are most fully realized in the mealy-mouthed, unflappably odd-duck character of Bean. Overall, however, the film suffers the same fate as many other projects in translation from the small screen to the big, experienced most frequently in the attempt to transform sketches from the NBC series Saturday Night Live to the cinema. In dumbing down the jokes, "opening up" a character (read: making an oddball less offensive), and generally seeking to broaden the appeal of a skit that might have been obscure or off-putting to some segment of the audience, mainstream films repeatedly sap their source material of the original humor. Such is often the case in this silly concoction that seeks to Americanize a thoroughly British invention by shooting it in the sun-drenched, rainbow-colored hues that scream "Comedy!" for the funny bone-impaired, even tossing actor Burt Reynolds into the addled mix -- as a general, no less. Worse, Mr. Bean is shockingly verbose in comparison to his earlier incarnations, a development that may have been essential to the narrative but robs the quirky spasmodic of his rib-tickling charm. Bean is a worthy attempt to bring a little-known comic's abundant skills to light, but the filmmakers don't trust their audience to "get it," with the end result suffering a serious case of lowest common denomination. ~ Karl Williams, All Movie Guide

Cast

• Rowan Atkinson - Mr. Bean
• Peter MacNicol - David Langley
• Pamela Reed - Alison Langley
• Harris Yulin - George Grierson
• Burt Reynolds - Gen. Newton

John Mills - Chairman; Richard Gant - Det. Brutus; Tricia Vessey - Jennifer Langley; Andrew Lawrence - Kevin Langley; Priscilla Shanks - Sylvia Grierson; Peter Egan - Lord Walton; Peter Capaldi - Gareth; Tom McGowan - Walter Merchandise; Sandra Oh - Bernice Schimmel; Danny Goldring - Security Buck; Janni Brenn - Nurse Dyper; June Brown - Delilah; David Doty - Doctor Jacobson; Larry Drake - Elmer; Johnny Galecki - Stingo Wheelie; Lela Ivey - Nurse Pots; Dakin Matthews - Tucker, Passenger; Chris Ellis - Detective Butler; Robert Curtis-Brown - Doctor Frowning; Richard Hicks - Kart Pusherman; Ronnie Yeskel - Mrs. Goodwoman; April Grace - Nurse Pans; Thomas Mills - Officer Stubbles; Perry Anzilotti - Doctor Squeaking; Scott Charles - Timmy Pewker Jr.; Peter James - Doctor Rosenblum; Annette Helde - Nurse Gripes; Julia Pearlstein - Phyllis Quill; Rob Brownstein - Dick Journo; Clive Corner - Doctor Cutler; Gigi Fields - Nurse Desking; Alison Goldie - Stewardess Nicely

Credit

Rowan Atkinson - Executive Producer; Rowan Atkinson - Screenwriter; Robin Driscoll - Screenwriter; Tim Bevan - Producer; Chris Blunden - Editor; Richard Curtis - Executive Producer; Richard Curtis - Screenwriter; Eric Fellner - Producer; Francis Kenny - Cinematographer; Peter Larkin - Production Designer; Rebecca O'Brien - Co-producer; Ronnie Yeskel - Casting; Michael Zimbrich - First Assistant Director; Kevin Constant - Art Director; Mel Smith - Director; Robert Anderson - Sound/Sound Designer; Peter Bennett-Jones - Producer; Howard Goodall - Songwriter

Similar Movies

The Jerk; The Man with One Red Shoe; The Pink Panther; Dumb and Dumber; Johnny English; The Stupids

the bean	Bean Bag
bean	Ll Bean