Bean

Rowan Atkinson, the most gifted and versatile comic performer in the English-speaking world, created an international sensation with his TV character Mr. Bean, a gangly, goggle-eyed maladroit with an adolescent's mischievous self-absorption. Bean, the movie, makes the critical error of jamming Bean into the same tired, conventional premise which has served as the vehicle for a hundred unconventional comedians--the "fish-out-of-water," casting Bean as a dolt mistaken for an art scholar. When Atkinson is allowed to do his thing, he's a genius, but director Mel Smith misses the point that "Mr. Bean" isn't about other people reacting to Bean's absurd antics; it's about Bean responding to his own absurd antics. He's a one-man comedy team. Optional. (S. Renshaw)