Mind­horn

Cin­e­ma is lit­tered with tor­tured true detec­tives and hard-boiled bad lieu­tenants, but there’s nev­er been any­one quite like Bruce Mind­horn. The deranged brain­child of writer-stars Julian Bar­ratt and Simon Farn­a­by, this sub­lime­ly sil­ly mock biog­ra­phy of sorts fol­lows washed-up British TV actor Richard Thorn­croft (played by Bar­ratt), who we’re intro­duced to via a crude­ly-pack­aged siz­zle reel culled from the ​’80s hey­day of the tit­u­lar light enter­tain­ment police procedural.

To describe Mind­horn as Thorncroft’s alter ego is espe­cial­ly accu­rate because it’s not entire­ly obvi­ous where one char­ac­ter ends and the oth­er begins. Which is exact­ly the point and pre­cise­ly why the film is so damn funny.

Jump­ing for­ward to the present day, we meet a bald­ing and bad­ly out of shape Thorn­croft in a poky flat in Waltham­stow. It quick­ly tran­spires that he’s been din­ing out on his short-lived pop­u­lar­i­ty ever since Mind­horn was pulled fol­low­ing its star’s indel­i­cate pub­lic com­ments about his fel­low cast members.

An awk­ward reunion is on the cards when a delu­sion­al Mind­horn super­fan goes on a killing spree on the Isle of Man, the set­ting for his favourite show (which he doesn’t realise is a show), inform­ing the local con­stab­u­lary that he’ll only nego­ti­ate with the ​“real” Mind­horn. Sens­ing an oppor­tu­ni­ty to mas­sage his bruised ego and snag some much-need­ed media expo­sure, Thorn­croft dusts off his tan jack­et and match­ing roll neck sweater, snaps on his ​“bion­ic” eye patch and hot­foots it to the ordi­nar­i­ly sleepy coastal town of Douglas.

This could have been anoth­er case of an amus­ing con­cept fail­ing to make the tran­si­tion to ful­ly-formed com­e­dy fea­ture. The kind of film that has its moments but doesn’t quite hang togeth­er, no mat­ter how much you will it to. No such cause for con­cern here, as every­one brings their A‑game in what is a con­sis­tent­ly far­ci­cal, fre­quent­ly hilar­i­ous hat-tip to a par­tic­u­lar sense of British humour.

Cult anti-sit­coms like Bot­tom and Garth Marenghi’s Dark­place are the most obvi­ous touch­stones, not to men­tion Barratt’s hith­er­to most-beloved cre­ation The Mighty Boosh, which inci­den­tal­ly pro­vid­ed a semi-reg­u­lar out­let for Farnaby’s like-mind­ed brand of char­ac­ter com­e­dy. The film also gen­tly ribs – maybe a lit­tle too suc­cess­ful­ly – cosy teatime detec­tive series like Berg­er­ac (lis­ten out for a John Net­tles namecheck) and The Pro­fes­sion­als, with their quaint ideas of alpha mas­culin­i­ty and rur­al life.

Apro­pos of noth­ing, Farn­a­by plays a chiefly-shirt­less Dutch man named Clive, who is the per­fect foil for our unlike­ly hero. Where once Clive took a back­seat as Thorncroft’s stunt dou­ble, now he’s shacked up with ex-Mind­horn tot­ty Patri­cia (Essie Davis) and cruis­es around in a vin­tage sports car, both of which Thorn­croft used to enjoy mak­ing purr. Worse still, Mind­horn bit-parter Peter East­man (Steve Coogan) has found fame and rel­a­tive for­tune in a long-run­ning spin-off show.

The sweet irony here is that Coogan recent­ly cashed in on his own comedic lega­cy with the Alan Par­tridge movie. A triv­ial obser­va­tion, per­haps, though we sus­pect that Coogan must have been at least a lit­tle bit peev­ed to learn that Mind­horn is far supe­ri­or to Alpha Papa.