"A Shot in the Dark" is the first Inspector Clouseau movie I've seen, and I'm rather confused as to why everyone has anointed it a classic. After seeing "Dr Strangelove" I was ready to declare Peter Sellers one of the greatest comic geniuses of all time, but this signature role of his left me very disappointed. Well, perhaps the bumbling French detective could be a truly great comic figure if he were the center of a really good movie--which "A Shot in the Dark" is not.
I think that a lot of problems with the movie lie with the direction. The opening scenes, especially, are taken at a ridiculously slow pace--I expected a fast and farcical comedy, but I got a lot of awkward pauses and stagy long takes. The whole movie would be much funnier if it were tightened up and edited with a snappier rhythm.
Other aspects of "A Shot in the Dark" are equally lazy. For most of the movie Sellers employs a light French accent, until in the final scene he suddenly acquires a much heavier and more ridiculous accent, saying "beump" instead of "bump" and other such Clouseau-isms. Did no one notice the inconsistency of this? Meanwhile, the jokes get predictable: by the halfway point of the movie, you just know that when Clouseau is asked to put a billiard cue away, he'll end up knocking over the whole cue rack, and when he tries to do a Cossack dance, he'll rip his trousers.
I did think that the sequence where Sellers and Elke Sommer go on a date and narrowly escape being murdered several times was rather well done--then again, ANYTHING would have to be better than the embarrassingly dated scene that takes place in a nudist colony. This is an example of the worst kind of 1960s wink-wink nudge-nudge sleaziness--the type of scene that "Austin Powers" mocked.
The plot of "A Shot in the Dark" is standard-issue Agatha Christie stuff, with Clouseau attempting to prove that a beautiful housemaid (Sommer) is innocent of a string of murders, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. But though the early part of the movie is weighed down by a lot of tedious examination of the murders, the filmmakers forget the plot as the movie goes on. In the final scene, they basically throw up their hands, admit they're bored with the story and characters, and tack on an arbitrary conclusion. So in the absence of an interesting story, skillful direction, and a sense of good taste, what are we left with? Peter Sellers doing pratfalls and talking in spoonerisms. Which isn't enough for me, thank you.
I think that a lot of problems with the movie lie with the direction. The opening scenes, especially, are taken at a ridiculously slow pace--I expected a fast and farcical comedy, but I got a lot of awkward pauses and stagy long takes. The whole movie would be much funnier if it were tightened up and edited with a snappier rhythm.
Other aspects of "A Shot in the Dark" are equally lazy. For most of the movie Sellers employs a light French accent, until in the final scene he suddenly acquires a much heavier and more ridiculous accent, saying "beump" instead of "bump" and other such Clouseau-isms. Did no one notice the inconsistency of this? Meanwhile, the jokes get predictable: by the halfway point of the movie, you just know that when Clouseau is asked to put a billiard cue away, he'll end up knocking over the whole cue rack, and when he tries to do a Cossack dance, he'll rip his trousers.
I did think that the sequence where Sellers and Elke Sommer go on a date and narrowly escape being murdered several times was rather well done--then again, ANYTHING would have to be better than the embarrassingly dated scene that takes place in a nudist colony. This is an example of the worst kind of 1960s wink-wink nudge-nudge sleaziness--the type of scene that "Austin Powers" mocked.
The plot of "A Shot in the Dark" is standard-issue Agatha Christie stuff, with Clouseau attempting to prove that a beautiful housemaid (Sommer) is innocent of a string of murders, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. But though the early part of the movie is weighed down by a lot of tedious examination of the murders, the filmmakers forget the plot as the movie goes on. In the final scene, they basically throw up their hands, admit they're bored with the story and characters, and tack on an arbitrary conclusion. So in the absence of an interesting story, skillful direction, and a sense of good taste, what are we left with? Peter Sellers doing pratfalls and talking in spoonerisms. Which isn't enough for me, thank you.