The Pink Panther (1963)'s comments

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Addicted2Cinema

It has a few very memorable and funny scenes, but overall it's boring and slow. Most scenes are about establishing and "building" the character relationships and it takes forever to pick up the pace. And Peter Sellers, ironically, doesn't appear as much in the film as everyone else.

11 years 3 months ago

Siskoid

You can definitely tell the original Pink Panther film wasn't meant to be a slapstick comedy. Peter Sellers was cast late as the clumsy and hapless Inspector Clouseau, and the entire tone of the film changed. For the better, in one sense, spawning a veritable franchise (albeit a weird one, as the Panther neither refers to the policeman nor the thief, but the jewel the latter is after). But what's good for movie history isn't necessarily so for the film itself. Sellers steals the show with his brand of physical comedy, but he's in a supporting role which means you're often sitting around waiting for one of his scenes. The convoluted caper requires Clouseau's wife to be one of the villains, cheating on him with the criminal Phantom, and because our hearts are with the clueless inspector, it makes the plot seem entirely too cruel. If this had been a movie about David Niven's gentleman thief, it might not be remembered as much, but it wouldn't have suffered from tonal changes and might have been a more consistent genre film. As is, it's neither as slick as a Niven picture should be, nor as funny as a Sellers picture should be.

4 years 11 months ago