Disc Reviews

Mortdecai Blu-ray Review

8th Jun 2015

There have been a lot of bad reviews of Mortdecai. It was even described as psychotically unfunny by The Telegraph. This is a little unfair. It may not be laugh a minute stuff but it certainly is fun. Johnny Depp plays Lord Charlie Mortdecai, an eccentric aristocrat brilliantly. Had the part been given to anyone else this film would not have worked nearly as well.

Curly moustachioed Mortdecai is a harmless but shady art dealer and perennially short of cash. So, when his manservant, Jock (Paul Bettany) announces that they are days away from insolvency he agrees to assist old college friend and officer in MI5, Alistair Maitland (Ewan McGregor) in the search for a stolen Goya painting. However, Charlie’s not the only one with his eye on the painting; a nymphomaniac, American heiress and a revolutionary want it too. Rumour has it that the artwork contains the bank codes to a secret account filled with Nazi gold.

The star-packed line up positively elevates expectations for this film way above what it actually delivers but that’s no fault of the cast. Johnny Depp and Ewan McGregor both turn in excellent performances but the highest praise has to go to Paul Bettany for his portrayal of Mortdecai’s over sexed security/manservant. He just plays it so perfectly. It’s difficult to pinpoint the aspect of this film that lets it down but it undoubtedly misses the dizzy heights it was aiming for.

The Blu-ray surprisingly only comes with two pieces of extra content. Two ten to fifteen minute long featurettes. One is your pretty standard behind the scenes view of filming, the second is a look into the soundtrack of the film. The music featurette is more interesting, especially as it was surprising to discover that Mark Ronson had a hand in it.

As much fun as this film was it doesn’t really have a particularly high re-watch factor but that first time is definitely worth a try.