In A FISH CALLED WANDA, veteran director Charles Crichton and scriptwriter-star John Cleese create a dazzling quilt from various strands of English and American comedy. The plot, in which four disparate characters attempt a daring heist, comes from Ealing caper comedies, such as Crichton’s own THE LAVENDER HILL MOB. Cleese and Michael Palin, as the hit man with a stutter and a love of animals, come from the anarchic tradition of Monty Python. The movie pays savage tribute to another Ealing comedy, THE LADYKILLERS, as Palin attempts to kill a witness to the gang’s getaway. The glamorous con woman (Jamie Lee Curtis) is from Preston Sturges’s great comedy THE LADY EVE, while Kevin Kline provides his own unique feverish comic intensity.
If John Cleese is not a very good actor, at least he is a very good writer. And together with the director, they came up with a very cute script, that runs along very well, and is perfect for Cleese, who does not have to overplay his part, and neither does he have to play the type he is so well used to in FAWLTY TOWERS, and the famous MONTY PYTHON skits. This is a well scripted and thought out story, which has confined the advantages of each actor into a nice little film. While far from great, it still is nice to sit through, and does have some funny moments, almost all of them centered on John Cleese, who seems to be specially suited to playing eccentric characters, the most difficult style of comedic roles.
