Bajaoing Bean...

I just saw Mr. Bean’s Holiday. I like the film. The reasons are three. One – I like it because I like Rowan Atkinson. Two – it takes you along with it, it does not leave you alone to be with yourself and sulk like you do at other times. Three – it gives a satirical eye view of the hollowness and unscrupulous acts that are committed in the name of cinema appreciation. I thought I would write about it just when I feel like writing about it, lest boredom take me off track and then make me forget what I indeed want to write.

I adore Atkinson because he can makes faces like no one else. Looking into the eyes of the people as you do weird things and know that they are watching you because you are doing things different from what others do is something that I do in the train everyday! And Bean does it so well.

He loves kids and he just cannot bear to see anyone hurt. Parts of him are inspired by the good-natured Stanley from Laurel & Hardy fame, both want to do good to others, but end up messing themselves up. Can we count the number of times he has saved a baby’s hydrogen balloon from flying off or has prevented some hoodlum from stealing a toddler’s candy bar, no matter which train has to go under or which dung he has to step through?

What keeps a Bean movie a league away from other comedies is the fact that there’s only one star in this – Atkinson himself. Other films have dialogues and they sound funny and make people laugh. Bean doesn’t not have to say anything to keep you entertained. His antics are enough to make you giggle and stick onto the screen. He’s just himself on screen, the original self. He’s genuine and does not feign things. He cannot hide emotions. He dances and frolicks when happy and jumps about, kicking things and stamping his foot down and hard when he’s really really angry. He “hmphs” and grunts and he makes sour faces. His face breaks down like that of a four-year old denied his first remote-controlled car by Santa because he had been a bad child all through the year. He throws tantrums and he acts stubborn till he gets what he wants. I have never seen him cry though, I guess there are lot of other films that people must watch to cry – here a Bean film marks another brownie point! This man is also full of surprises. You know he has messed up and are preparing yourself to see him get pulled by his collar and thrown into a prison, but hey, he’s escaped out of there before you could even bat an eyelid!

In this film, he gets to go on a holiday for free – a prize that he wins through a raffle. He gets to go to Cannes to visit a blue water, white sand beach and to reach the place, he has to fly, then get into a train and then go by bus. The film goes on beautifully like a holiday video, seemingly shot through Bean’s own camcorder, a prize that accompanied his holiday package, dutifully ‘donated’ by some gracious soul. Superb editing too. A masterpiece – a kid is playing with a toy train at the raffle draw, the train goes into a tunnel and out emerges a real train, with an excited Bean inside it!

Bean wants himself video-cammed all the way to his holiday destination. He props up the camera as he eats at a fine-dine place as he crunches lobster shells and is taught to slimy savour oyster flesh by the waiters. He has other people shoot him as he walks to the train door and asks for re-takes and re-takes and then he makes them lose their train. And like I said, he’ll do just about anything to save a kid or reunite him with his parents. On the way, he’ll meet a beautiful girl, who reminds me of my girlfriend for her delicateness and the creamy smoothness that her cheeks exude. Probably the girl starts to like him, but Bean has only one dream – his all expenses paid vacation! Still, on the way, he’ll fulfill that girl’s dream to become a superstar and makes her much sough after for autographs.

May be the girl starts to like him, but in the end, Bean is loyal to his partner, he’ll only go to bed with his teddy bear – a constant companion, though it has been denied a part of the limelight in this film.

Atkinson once wakes up to find himself in a real village, with a rustic band playing soft music, a lady in a flowery bonnet serving tea to gentleladies and gentlemen who sit talking under an orangish sun. he knows later that he is caught inside the set of an ad film!

The film takes you on a vacation to Cannes. Enough of Aishwarya and Abhishek strutting their married booties at the shutterbugs. Make way, for Rowan Atkinson is here! The golden sands, the cool, blue wetness and the warm sun. Warm and wet and cosy! I want to go to the beach with my girlfriend. She does not like sand and water, but I assume she wouldn’t mind us walking hand in hand a little away from the water.

And then there are potshots at the award film circuits. You see the director wringing his hands in exasperation and wiping his brow, pensive of how his film will be received, while the one sitting right beside him yawns. The film itself, shows the director in the lead role, running about like Kunal Khemu in a Daredevil costume while the subtitles go – from the makers of the director’s film, directed by the director, produced by the director, starring the director and so on and so forth.

While the audience yawns, Bean drops by, gets into the broadcast room and plays his camcorder tape instead of the directed director’s film and it ends with bean’s newly found girl kissing Bean on his cheek. Bean somehow gets to the stage and shines under the spotlight. Security agents and the director are up on the stage trying to get the intruder out, when suddenly the audience is on its feet voicing their appreciation with a standing ovation.