The Brothers Grimsby

Surprise of the year! Grimsby is as essential and groundbreaking for the comedy genre as I Spit On Your Grave was for exploitation. The biggest comedy hit since Shut Up! Sacha Baron Cohen goes bonkers here and delivers the best comedic and situational humor of his career. There is an incredible amount of allusions to movies, actors and celebrities, and snappy gags at intervals of every five minutes, and scenes that will leave a strange aftertaste in your mouth. The best thing in the the film is the action, which is so good that it surpasses even some action films (it's brisk, brutal, gritty and original, though furiously edited, it has drive). The icing on the cake are Scott Adkins' fight with Borat, the elephant bukkake party and the testicle sucking. I feel like watching it again. Awesome stuff. 100% (03/21/2016)

Sacha Baron Cohen goes a little farther (or, ahem, deeper) with each film, and this time it was a little too far (deep) for my tastes in places. But what can I say, I had more fun than with Bruno and a bit more than with The Dictator, and I think that once in a while a comedy like this doesn't hurt either. My admiration goes to Mark Strong, who went all in. (02/04/2020)

I would be interested in knowing if Penélope Cruz knew when she signed on to this project that she would appear in the same film as Mark Strong’s testicles, Gabourey Sidibe’s crotch and a hectolitre of elephant ejaculate. The film succeeds in presenting all of the above without coming across as a random sequence of gags (though it’s not far from it) and without the punchline (always) consisting in the distastefulness or imbecility of the given joke. With his guileless rejection of what is proper in a civilised society, Cohen’s Nobby, proudly claiming to be English scum, fulfils a purpose similar to that of the earlier Ali G and Borat – he shows the pretence in which all intellectuals, petty bourgeois and snobs live, as they reveal their true face and true intentions when confronted with a man whom they despise too much to take seriously (among other things, this year’s American presidential election showed us what that can lead to). The other characters are (unintentionally) led to being exposed by Nobby, and the viewer is then (intentionally) led by the redneck jokes, which are drawn out to the point of absurdity. Sure, The Brothers Grimsby is very much a hit-or-miss affair, the editing could have been less frantic and the seriously depicted flashbacks (and the whole storyline about the importance of family) disrupt the pace and tone of the narrative, but I still found it funnier and more subversive than most mainstream comedies. The fourth star is for giving Donald Trump AIDS. 70%. (11/21/2016)

Along with The Dictator, the best thing Cohen has made.  A cocktail of engaging action scenes with sophisticated as well as scatological humor that oddly works as a whole. Plus, the cast is very interesting, resulting in a well-made and unpretentious comedy. (07/08/2016)

Sometimes good, but sometimes intentionally brutally disgusting. So disgusting, in fact, that it goes beyond disgust. And I deliberately played this comedy right after Animal with Belmondo to realize what kind of comedies were made back then and what kind of comedies are made today. And I have to admit that I much prefer the kind of comedies they madeback then. Now they only seem to be fighting for their moment in the sun by trying to fit as many disgusting things as possible on an eight-millimeter film. (07/11/2016)