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Editorial Review:
Amazon.com:
Monty Python's John Cleese makes this lighthearted farce work as a tightly wound, punctilious public school headmaster whose well-organized life unravels in a series of disasters on his journey to a conference. Cleese is a master of fussy, fastidious characters in exasperating situations, bottling up his frustration under good manners and sardonic comments until he finally blows, but he's also startlingly vulnerable as he systematically loses all sense of himself. Dressed in monk's robes and stranded on a lonely country road, he looks down at his naked wrist and sighs, 'I've even lost the time.' Michael Fryan (the playwright of Noises Off) doesn't really have much of a story behind the situations, but he provides plenty of complications, and Cleese holds the film together with his brittle manner, single-minded drive, and hilarious headmaster's condescending haughtiness. While it will seem slight to many, Cleese fans will love it. --Sean Axmaker
Customer Reviews
Average Rating: 
Rating:  - It has John Cleese... of course it's funny!
Ok, I love John Cleese. This movie is a great sleeper starring the master. There is less physical comedy and more subtle comedy in this film, and I like that. It will never be listed among his master works I'm sure, but a great and cute little film. If you like Cleese, this belongs in your collection.
Rating:  - Wrapped too tight
The tight fabric of the tight little British
island unravels slowly and hilariously in this
English entropic comedy. John Cleese, late
of Monty Python, is splendid as the overwrapped
butt of the joke, and Sharon Maiden as his
unwilling travelling companion is a sexy
comic little treasure.
Director Christopher Morahan, who did Jewel
in the Crown is playing again with the theme
of the middle-class overacheiver. In Jewel,
he's the ... Read More
Rating: - The longest distance between two points
It's pretty ironic that this film came out the same year as the similarly plotted "Planes, Trains and Automobiles". The concept of persons trying to get from Point A to Point B only to find themselves at Points C through Q first has been fodder for movie comedies for years. (Think of "It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World" or any of the Hope/Crosby "Road to..." movies.)
Only one thing makes this film different from the others. (You guessed it!) John Cleese. Rather than exploding at every mishap ... Read More
Rating:  - What a hoot!
This is Cleese doing what Cleese does best. Right, I mean insanity by inches.
He starts as a utterly rigid headmaster, the kind so precise that he stops in mid-sentence to make sure that the clock ticks when it should. Right. He sets out, at the precise moment, to accept a major award for himself and his school. Right?
Right.
Then just a little thing happens. A very little thing. He asks the way to the train - which is it? Left?
Right.
And ... Read More
Rating: - Not as funny as A Fish Called Wanda
I've watched a few of the movies that Cleese has been in (Monty Python series; A Fish Called Wanda, Fierce Creatures etc...) and have found them all to be quite funny, so I had high hopes when I got this movie.
Basically, Cleese is an uptight headmaster of a British School whose punctiliousness has led to his being chosen as the chairman of the National Headmasters Association (or some such name). Unfortunately on the day when he is to give his speech, a series of incidents occur that could ... Read More
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