Alan Partridge: Alpha Papa

Steve Coogan's Alan Partridge character is something of a British national icon. At the least a cult national icon. Debuting on BBC Radio 4's On The Hour as a bumbling, incompetent sports correspondent before transiting to TV on the excellent show Knowing Me, Knowing You With Alan Partridge and then the highly-praised I'm Alan Partridge.  Now in 2013, the character is adapted to the big screen in Alan Partridge: Alpha Papa.

 

As a fan of the TV shows, I went into this with pretty high expectations, not helped by the critical praised being heaped upon it. Haven't seen anything from director Declan Lowney except his work on Father Ted, which is cause for optimism though.

 

Anyhoo, straight into the plot. Since it's pretty minimal, I'll let some obscure site/Wikipedia to summarise it for me (Lazyness ladies and gentlemen)

 

"After being fired from North Norfolk Digital when it is taken over by a multinational conglomerate and renamed Shape, a disgruntled DJ returns to the station during an office party with a gun and holds the station hostage. The only person he'll talk to during siege negotiations is fellow DJ Alan Partridge who, as he quickly becomes the public and media face of the siege, sees an opportunity to stage a triumphant return to the limelight. "

 

A-ha!

 

A nice and simple story, one that could easily be condensed into a 30 minute TV episode but one that I'm glad they stuck with. No going to America or cheap gimmicks like that, "Alan out of water" tales would of been terrible.

 

The cast is solid, with Coogan on top form as the titular character and Colm Meany (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Die Hard 2) is fantastic as antagonist Pat Farrell. Felicity Montagu  returns from the I'm Alan Partridge series as his unfortunate personal assistant and she does a fine job here too, producing a few laugh out loud moments on her own, somewhat different from the series where she is the butt of jokes. Reprising their roles also are Simon Greenall as Michael, Alan's troubled Geordie friend, who thankfully gets a more limited screen time than the show, letting the jokes pop up intermittently through the film rather than oversaturating them, it allows for more hits than misses. Phil Cornwell reprises rival DJ Dave Clifton but doesn't get much presence.

 

No reunion for Lazarus aka Debonair aka Bangkok :(

 

Although all the winks and nods are great, I am a little disappointed by the lack of Knowing Me, Knowing You references.  Even a little cameo from Glen Ponder would of been fantastic. Ah well, bit of a nit-pick really. There is zero Abba music though and that sucks.

 

Declan Lowney's direction is fine, it occasionally flutters into TV territory but it's well shot and well lit so I ain't gonna bitch and moan. Whether it's him or simply the script, they handle the drama and emotional scenes well, they don't feel juxtaposed in and the contrast between the humour and the serious is never jarring.

 

Alan Partridge: Alpha Papa might not translate as well for audiences outside the UK but it's a well-written, genuinely funny film that (barely) escapes the curse of TV-comedy being turned into badly adapted movies. It occasionally suffers from some mistakes though, obviously some jokes are a miss, it's take a while for the pace of the plot to move along as it takes a while to establish the characters (and style of humour) for those unaware of the franchise. Still, it's hilarious and I recommend it highly.

 

79/100 - Entertaining and funny movie that not only reaffirms the British stereotypes of comedy but openly embraces it.