Trevor (Rowan Atkinson) has never achieved much in his life, and of late he has set himself modest goals - like going on a camping trip with his daughter Maddy (India Fowler), who lives with his divorced wife (Claudie Baker). And to be able to afford this, he has accepted a job as housesitter in Christian (Julian Rhind-Tutt) And Nina's (Jing Lusi) home - which is not just any home but a high tech mansion full of priceless works of art, and which Trevor has to share with a dog with all sorts of food allergies. At first everything goes reasonably fine, even if Trevor accidently butns the manual that explains the inner workings of the house and now has to rely on his own (modest) wits to navigate around the place without causing too much damage. And then a bee somehow gets into the house, a bee that's quickly driving Trevor crazy, and he goes to more and more extremes to kill it - in consequence destroying most of the works of art in the house, as well as a prized vintage car, and ultimately burning the place down. That he somehow also catches a trio of burglars (Daniel Fearn, Gediminas Adomaitis, Christian Alifoe) along the way happens more by mistake than design, and doesn't save him from going to prison once the home owners return, catching him torchin the place with a flamethrower. But there still is a silver lining on his horizon ...

When Rowan Atkinson hit the TV screen with Mr. Bean in 1990, he, already well-established in his native UK, became a household name pretty much over night on an international level for basically bringing slapstick comedy back to television. And while the series was at least in parts undeniably funny, it limited Atkinson to just making silly faces and neglected his dramatic abilities, while the Mr. Bean skits were always somewhat random and without consequence. Man vs. Bee tries to an extent rectify this as it gives Atkinson's funnyman character a dramatic background, motivation, and also a voice - and Atkinson carries the role very well, giving his character the right amount of heart. And the slapstick in this movie is well-conceived, in its best scenes even reminiscent of Buster Keaton's output. And yet this (circa feature film-length) miniseries fails to hit all the right spots: For one, the film's titular concept man vs. bee is to little to expand to a series of this length (even if many of the ideas to drive the concept to new heights are pretty good), and also Trevor's basic motivation is driven home a bit too strongly. But this said, this is still a fun series, one just can't but admit that it fails to reach full potential.

review © by Mike Haberfelner

 

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