The Trip to Italy

As a huge fan of British comedy, I am extremely familiar with the works of both Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon. I felt "The Trip" captured these two wonderfully and I found the whole film charming, funny, and a poignant insight into their characters. But that magic I felt in the first film is strangely absent in this sequel. Gone were the long sequences of obviously ad-libbed scenes where the two gifted actors just riffed off each other, replaced instead by too much script and rehearsed moments. I also felt the actions of Brydon's character were in direct violation with what we know of him from the first film. I do acknowledge that there were attempts to deal with this breach of character, but not enough to repair the damage in my eyes. On the whole this film felt forced where the original felt fresh and vibrant. If I'd not seen the first film this might have fared better with me, but as it is, it feels stale and not representative of what these two can really do together. 3/5

The Trip to Italy on Netflix