Paddington in Peru
A feeble, generic follow-up to the first two witty and ingenious films is more than just a disappointment.
The gang’s all here: Samuel Joslin, Madeleine Harris, Paddington, Emily Mortimer, Hugh Bonneville and Julie Walters
Image courtesy of StudioCanal.
Suddenly, Cocaine Bear doesn’t seem so bad after all. It was inevitable that Paddington in Peru could not live up to the high bar set by Paddington 2, one of few sequels that trumped the original film (cf. The Godfather Part II, Top Gun: Maverick, The Suicide Squad). But this? Following P2’s international gross of $227.3 million, a follow-up may have been a foregone conclusion, although Sally Hawkins jumping ship as Mary Brown (replaced here by Emily Mortimer) may have flagged up how risible a thing the new script is. Not only are the one-liners dismal and often pointless, but the sight gags are ripped straight from other movies, while the score is a greatest hits of hackneyed musical moments (‘The Blue Danube’, ‘William Tell Overture’, et al). This might not matter to the film’s intended audience – maybe the pratfalls of a bear in Peru will be enough to compensate for the price of the popcorn – but their elders will surely cringe.
No sooner has Paddington acquired a British passport, than he and the entire Brown family, including their housekeeper Mrs Bird (Julie Walters), set off for a holiday in Peru to meet up with Paddington’s beloved Aunt Lucy, who has expressed a feeling of loneliness. Pitching up at the House for Retired Bears, run by a convent of nuns overseen by a guitar-strumming Olivia Colman, the ensemble is told that Aunt Lucy has disappeared, leaving behind her spectacles, a bracelet and a map. Convincing the skipper of a riverboat (Antonio Banderas channelling Klaus Kinski in Fitzcarraldo, complete with an on-deck gramophone – ho-ho), the Browns head down river to start their search…
In the film’s favour, Peru makes for an astonishing backdrop, even as it dredges up an embarrassing collection of clichés about the Amazon. On the downside, the director of the first two outings, Paul King, has joined Sally Hawkins, leaving the helm to first-time director Dougal Wilson. Under the disquieting circumstances, the cast does the best it can, with Emily Mortimer giving her scenes extra welly and Olivia Colman determined to have some fun (complete with a Julie Andrews flourish). But it’s the script that is mainly at fault, being a lazy, uninspired and convoluted affair, scarring the memory of Paddington forever. It’s just as well that the Queen is no longer around to see her tea-time companion reduced to such straits.
JAMES CAMERON-WILSON
Cast: Hugh Bonneville, Emily Mortimer, Julie Walters, Jim Broadbent, Madeleine Harris, Samuel Joslin, Olivia Colman, Antonio Banderas, Carla Tous, Hayley Atwell, Joel Fry, Sanjeev Bhaskar, Robbie Gee, Ben Miller, Jessica Hynes, Simon Farnaby, Ella Bruccoler, Hugh Grant, and the voices of Ben Whishaw and Imelda Staunton.
Dir Dougal Wilson, Pro Rosie Alison, Screenplay Mark Burton, Jon Foster and James Lamont, Ph Erik Wilson, Pro Des Andy Kelly, Ed Úna Ní Dhonghaíle, Music Dario Marianelli, Costumes Charlotte Walter, Sound Rob Malone, Dialect coach Elspeth Morrison.
Heyday Films/StudioCanal UK/StudioCanal/Columbia Pictures/Stage 6 Films/Kinoshita Group/Marmalade Pictures/TSG Entertainment-StudioCanal.
106 mins. UK/USA/France/Japan. 2024. UK Rel: 8 November 2024. US Rel: 17 January 2025. Cert. PG.
