3 Ups And 2 Downs From David Brent: Life On The Road

Has Ricky Gervais run out of steam?

David Brent Ups Downs
BBC/eOne

The history of the Great British Sitcom Movie is hardly an illustrious one. Popularised in the 1970s by after-the-fact releases that aimed to capitalise on the dwindling popularity of a once-massive hit before it disappeared forever, they were almost exclusively rushed cash-ins. Unsurprisingly, most were cack, regardless of the quality of the original series; this is how we got such classics as Holiday On The Buses, The Likely Lads and Rising Damp (the latter of which was just a remake of the series).

That tradition is, to a degree, still alive and well today – every year brings some new dross like Mrs. Brown's Boys D'Movie - but there’s been something of a recent shift in amongst the tat. In 2011 The Inbetweeners Movie was a major box office smash despite still being a stretched regular episode padded out with insular vignettes, and its sequel repeated the trick with added narrative weight in 2014. And then there was Alan Partridge; Alpha Papa’s a modern comedy classic, and is clearly the inspiration for us getting a David Brent movie.

Just like Partridge is a multimedia icon born out of rather humble beginnings (he was originally just a ), Ricky Gervais has tried to turn The Office’s David Brent into a recurring comedy fixture. The problem is, The Office ended pretty resolutely – Finchy got told to stuff it, Tim got Dawn and Brent was accepted for the briefest moment - so is any more time with the character necessary?

Well, kinda, yeah. Life On The Road is a surprisingly enjoyable comedy flick that sees Ricky Gervais cap off his greatest creation in fitting, if not totally perfect from. Here's three ups and two downs from the film.

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Contributor
Contributor

Film Editor (2014-2016). Loves The Usual Suspects. Hates Transformers 2. Everything else lies somewhere in the middle. Once met the Chuckle Brothers.