Guest House Paradiso
| Guest House Paradiso | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Directed by | Adrian Edmondson |
| Written by | Rik Mayall Adrian Edmondson |
| Produced by | Phil McIntyre |
| Starring | Rik Mayall Adrian Edmondson |
| Music by | Colin Towns |
| Distributed by | Universal Pictures |
Release date | 3 December 1999 |
Running time | 89 minutes |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
| Budget | £3,000,000 |
Guest House Paradiso is a 1999 British slapstick black comedy film written by and starring comic duo Rik Mayall and Adrian Edmondson, and directed by Edmondson - his directorial debut for a feature film.[1]
The film is semi-officially based on their comedy television series Bottom (in some territories, the DVD cover refers to it as The Bottom Movie). The key difference in the characters is in their surnames: Mayall's character, known as "Richard Richard" in the TV show, is here referred to as "Richard Twat" (although he regularly and angrily insists on the pronunciation "Thwaite"). Edmondson's character changes from "Edward Elizabeth Hitler" in the TV/live show to "Edward Elizabeth Ndingombaba". Despite this difference, both characters retain the same personalities as their TV counterparts. The film was made at Ealing Studios and on location on the Isle of Wight.
Plot
Richard "Richie" Richard (Mr Twat/Thwaite) and Edward "Eddie" Elizabeth Ndingombaba Hitler (Rik Mayall and Adrian Edmondson) run the worst guest house in the United Kingdom ("You're not in any of the guidebooks. Nobody for miles around - an oasis of calm. Even the peasants in the village denied its existence."), neighbouring a poorly maintained nuclear power station. The chef is not only unable to cook, but is both an idiotic drunkard and an illegal immigrant and eventually leaves due to not being paid and worse of it the waiter is not to be seen as Richie believe that he's in the hospital ("Have you seen Pascal? Oh, damn. I'll have to phone the psychiatric hospital, he's probably checked himself in again!") but obviously not being paid too or insulted by his boss. The guests (one of them played by Bill Nighy) are thoroughly dissatisfied by the poor service, and all decide to leave, except for one "Mrs Foxfur" (Fenella Fielding) who lives there.
Life seems bleak for Eddie and Richie, but things seemingly improve with the arrival of the "Nice family", with Simon Pegg playing the father. Furthermore, the famous Italian actress "Gina Carbonara" (Hélène Mahieu) comes to stay in the grotty house while seeking safety from her ill-tempered fiancé Gino Bolognese (Vincent Cassel). However Gino does eventually find her at the guest house as Eddie and Richard had put her name up in lights outside in order to attract more guests. Later, Richie finds some fish, which fell off a military lorry heading away from the nuclear power station. Richie and Eddie don't realise that the fish had been contaminated by a radiation leak until after they've fed them to the guests.
Hours later, with everybody violently ill from the radioactive fish, the guests are all projectile vomiting at high velocity and in huge quantities — all except for Gina Carbonara, apparently the only guest who did not eat the fish. In an act of spontaneous solidarity (given that no other guests have had any contact with Gino), every guest projectile vomits on him at once, forcing him backwards, out through a window and off a cliff edge into the ocean. Government agents arrive to hush up the incident and give Eddie and Richie ten million pounds, first class tickets to the Caribbean and new identities for both the duo and Gina in exchange for their silence over the leak. The three accept the offer, and head to the Caribbean. In the film's final scene, Eddie winks to the camera after commenting "How lucky he was the only fatality. Otherwise there'd be a moral question mark hanging over our escape."
Cast
- Rik Mayall as Richard Richard, Mr Twat/Thwaite
- Adrian Edmondson as Eddie Elizabeth Ndingombaba
- Vincent Cassel as Gino Giuseppe Bolognese
- Hélène Mahieu as Gina Tortellini Carbonara
- Bill Nighy as Mr Johnson
- Kate Ashfield as Ms Hardy
- Simon Pegg as Mr Nice
- Fenella Fielding as Mrs Foxfur
- Lisa Palfrey as Mrs Nice
- Steve O'Donnell as Chef Lardy Barsto
- James D'Arcy as Newly Wedded Husband
- Kate Loustau as Newly Wedded Wife
Reception
Empire gave the film two stars out of five stating "The boys toil incredibly hard to make the whole thing work and, while there are some hilarious moments, it is far too patchy for a full feature film.".[2]
The film has a 67% audience rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
