In defence of Ricky Gervais and ‘Special Correspondents’

Special Correspondents is a funny movie. It’s light-hearted, not one-dimensional like comedies featuring Will Farrell and Kevin Hart. It is neither genre-defining the way The Office was nor does it have the auteur qualities of a Woody Allen creation.

And that is the biggest hurdle of any Ricky Gervais creation – that it will never be as original, as culturally relevant as The Office. Expectations remain high always because he and his writing partner and co-creator Stephen Merchant have delivered one of the most original pieces of work in the last decade-and-a-half. Merchant co-wrote and co-directed The Office, Extras, Cemetery Junction, and Life’s Too Short.

Extras was a very funny show. You found yourself laughing at the jokes even though they weren’t served on a platter as is the way of the majority of sitcoms. The only similarities it had with The Office were the theme of fame as a soul-crushing aspiration, and the very memorable song scenes that didn’t feel forced. Then there were the podcasts that birthed The Ricky Gervais Show. Here, Gervais and Merchant were only the side pieces. It should have been called The Karl Pilkington show. The Ricky Gervais Show wouldn’t have worked without the outrageous yet simple thinking of Karl Pilkington. They’re podcasts I return to often— hilarious, unforced and unpretentious.

I liked the Invention of Lying but didn’t care much for Ghost Town, Gervais’s starring movie role. One saw the mannerisms, the roll of the eyes and movement of the head, and one could be forgiven for seeing David Brent from The Office.

Ricky Gervais is an actor with a narrow acting range– one with the same accent in every role. This characteristic should not be confused with David Brent, a character that Gervais and Merchant created from the ridiculousness and ignorance of a multitude of horrible bosses.

Life’s Too Short felt emptier than it should have. The ingredients were right and the format ripe. Warrick Davis was funny but celebrity guest appearances felt rather forced and Gervais and Merchant presence was distracting.

In Special Correspondents, audiences see the mannerisms of Ian Finch, the tilt of the head, the roll of the eyes, and they’re transported to The Office again. You’re torn between laughing at a joke or not, and wanting to hate it. It will never be a fair expectation. People judge every new project of his against David Brent. They accuse him of playing the same character all the time. Where Gervais ends and Brent begins is topic for a debate.

So let’s forget about the legacy and reputation of Ricky Gervais. Let’s review Special Correspondents without importing any of the baggage that a Ricky Gervais/David Brent and his vocal atheism and no-holds barred comedy brings.

Eric Bana and Gervais play Frank Bonneville and Ian Finch. Frank is a cool radio correspondent and Ian his nerdy sound engineer. They are assigned to cover the breakout of a civil war in Ecuador but a series of bumbling and unfortunate events drive them to lie and manufacture reports from the spare room above a café owned by a Spanish-speaking couple.

The relationship between Finch and Bonneville doesn’t seem forced. There is angst in Bana’s, an air of superiority. He hates that he is still stuck in the middle, in a radio station. The acting makes up for the wavering accent. The character of a dashing and charming man who believes he is better than where he is at, that he cannot understand why he hasn’t reached higher pastures yet is pulled off well.

The screenplay is well-written, and the other actors were even better than the Gervais and Bana. Vera Farminga as Eleanor Finch, the anti-heroine, the wife from hell was amazingly good. You felt her frustration. And the same praise must be heaped on America Ferrera and Raul Costillo, playing a lovable but daft couple.

What were its negatives? Eric Bana’s American accent which sounds awful even to an Indian audience. The film feels neither like a mainstream Hollywood comedy nor does it go against the grain. Special Correspondents will not be regarded as a Ricky Gervais masterpiece, but it does whet the appetite for more of his movies.