Steve Coogan wrote and stars in 'The Parole Officer', an Ealing-esque take on high-tech heist movies like 'Ocean's Eleven', with various nods to James Bond, 'The Italian Job' and a host of other films gently lampooned within. Coogan plays Simon Garden, a nerdy, PC-talking parole officer who masterminds an unlikely bank job in the name of justice. There are funny moments in this portrayal, but it's a dull role which almost requires the opposite of acting: the squarer and more awkward Coogan sounds, the more in-character he is. This sort of thing can work in a "mockumentary" ('The Office' obviously comes to mind), but whether such low-key, observational comedy can really work in a comedy thriller is a different question: one might say that the very unlikeliness of this scenario is the film's selling point, but mostly it just seems lame. (I had the same problem with Coogan's (much funnier) creation, talk-show host Alan Partridge, who was horribly believable as a person but, unlike his brilliant U.S. rival Larry Sanders, never convincing as someone who would actually get on T.V.; likewise, Simon the bank-robber never rings true). Perhaps aware that it can't make its plot line stick, 'The Parole Officer' descends into obvious parody and a odd collection of gags, some cringe-worthy, some potentially funny (but only in a more realistic setting). Overall, a very flat film caught uncomfortably between slapstick and black farce.
Review of The Parole Officer
