There exist great movies and riveting tales about the European longing to dominate Black Africa and grab and hoard its resources : "The Gorilla bit the Archbishop" is not among them. There exist great movies and riveting tales about ruthless robber barons and criminal business schemes : "The Gorilla bit the Archbishop" is not among them. There exist great movies and riveting tales about hired assassins... but you know the rest.
I gather "The Gorilla" is a member of a series, but I never saw the preceeding movies. It is a pretty tame and lame movie about the adventures of an ace intelligence agent nicknamed..., well you get it, who is supposed to put a stop to nefarious business intrigues (including assassination attempts) spanning two continents. The movie, to put it politely, does not contain much in the way of suspense, tension, emotion, relevance or logic.
This does not mean that "The Gorilla bit the Archbishop" is without entertainment value - on the contrary. Most of its deliberate attempts at wit, fun and manly banter fall flat, but it is littered with little flaws and inconsistencies. There are scenes, characters, plot twists or lines of dialogue so feeble, so inept, so inexplicable that they achieve a certain kind of surreal poetry. This is especially true for the fight scenes, which were inspired by professional wrestling and share the sport's liking for truth and realism. You can actually see the various actors and stuntmen prepare themselves to catch, lift or support their partner the right way.
A small example of the movie's WTF-ness : our hero (who, by the way, is played by a likeable actor who deserves better) knows how the perform "the gorilla bite". It works like this : you bite your opponent in the hand, on a very specific spot, and the hand goes numb and useless for some time. And indeed, you see the protagonist inflict his signature bite, with all the seasoned cool of a master swordsman performing a secret duelling trick taught to him by his father. Who ever said that the martial arts are useless ?
I do not regret the 80 minutes or so I spent watching the movie : it made me laugh out loud, for all the wrong reasons.
I gather "The Gorilla" is a member of a series, but I never saw the preceeding movies. It is a pretty tame and lame movie about the adventures of an ace intelligence agent nicknamed..., well you get it, who is supposed to put a stop to nefarious business intrigues (including assassination attempts) spanning two continents. The movie, to put it politely, does not contain much in the way of suspense, tension, emotion, relevance or logic.
This does not mean that "The Gorilla bit the Archbishop" is without entertainment value - on the contrary. Most of its deliberate attempts at wit, fun and manly banter fall flat, but it is littered with little flaws and inconsistencies. There are scenes, characters, plot twists or lines of dialogue so feeble, so inept, so inexplicable that they achieve a certain kind of surreal poetry. This is especially true for the fight scenes, which were inspired by professional wrestling and share the sport's liking for truth and realism. You can actually see the various actors and stuntmen prepare themselves to catch, lift or support their partner the right way.
A small example of the movie's WTF-ness : our hero (who, by the way, is played by a likeable actor who deserves better) knows how the perform "the gorilla bite". It works like this : you bite your opponent in the hand, on a very specific spot, and the hand goes numb and useless for some time. And indeed, you see the protagonist inflict his signature bite, with all the seasoned cool of a master swordsman performing a secret duelling trick taught to him by his father. Who ever said that the martial arts are useless ?
I do not regret the 80 minutes or so I spent watching the movie : it made me laugh out loud, for all the wrong reasons.
