Jim Broadbent

Paddington 2 review

When you witness some of the absolute dross that passes for 'family entertainment' these days, it's reassuring to see something as lovingly crafted as this. The next question? Can they do it a third time? Well, that remains to be seen. Meanwhile, this will do very nicely indeed.

Mr Bean makes his TV return in airline safety video

British Airways has released the director's cut of its new star-studded safety information video. The airline bagged an impressive A-list cast to 'audition' for a part in its new pre-take off clip in front of comedian Asim Chaudhry in aid of Comic Relief.

10 top tens for Hot Fuzz's tenth

This year, after watching Hot Fuzz for the tenth time, and still picking up little details I'd never noticed before, I went down to the pub for a glass of celebratory cranberry juice. I thought Anglonerd magazine, too, should celebrate the brilliance of this film in a big way, so here is not just a top ten list, but ten top ten lists, highlighting the best one hundred things about Edgar Wright's comedy action flick. *Spoilers*

Bridget Jones's Baby review: "a bundle of joy"

Renée Zellweger's hapless heroine is pregnant - but unsure who the father is - in a comedy sequel that really delivers.

Although most of Victoria Wood's work since 1985 had been for the BBC - including her sketch series As Seen on TV and the sitcom dinnerladies - she fell out with the corporation in 2009 when her seasonal specal, All the Trimmings, commissioned for Christmas Day, was dumped in a lesser slot without consultation.

Possibly because of this, only ITV was able to gain access to the writer-comedian's closest colleagues - including Julie Walters, Duncan Preston and Celia Imrie - for Let's Do It: A Tribute to Victoria Wood. There was also a suspicion that, in relation, the BBC might have been mean about releasing clips: there was so little material from dinnerladies and As Seen on TV that the opening titles had to be used as illustration.

Despite smart use of DVDs of stage shows and clps from a 1996 South Bank Show, the talking heads between the extracts adopted the now standard TV obit-show tone of rave about the person in the grave. James Corden explained that "she just made a lot of people laugh". Sir Lenny Henry averred that "she was just brilliant", while Jim Broadbent siad: "You just think, God, what a special person!'"

Attention was rightly paid to Wood's epic comic song, The Ballard of Barry and Freda. But, rather than reference to its double internal rhymes or climactic triple rhymes or the comic effect of domestic detail (lagging, grouting, flameproof nightie), we got a string of celebs calling the song "brilliant" and David Threlfall[/o] declaring: "Is there no end to this woman's talent?" Well, sadly, Dave, yes, there was, which is why an ITV crew is in your dressing room.

If the 90 per cent empty auditorium in which I saw this film earlier this week is any guide, TV comic Harry Hill has not struck gold, but something much smellier, with his graduation to the big screen.

Maybe it's Marmite, for people either love or hate his brand of comedy. As with Marmite, if you don't have the taste for it, it's not easily acquired, and it won't be acquired here.

Like Russ Abbot and Freddie Starr, before him, Hill revels in the adjective 'madcap', and there is certainly a strong madcap element to this tale of the ever-genial Harry and his nan (an exceedingly game Julie Walters) taking their apparently terminally-ill hamster (in fact, a cuddly toy) to Blackpool.

On the way they run into Jim Broadbent, playing a three-armed female cleaner in a nuclear power station, and Sheridan Smith, who plays the princess in a nautical tribe of shell people. Meanwhile, they are pursued by two villains dispatched by Harry's evil identical twin Otto (Matt Lucas).

Hill has attracted some top-notch British talent. Whether they read the script first is open to question.

Otto is cross because he was given up for adoption to a group of Alsatians in Kettering, and from that you get a hint of the kind of humour that prevails.

It's surreal, for sure, but the kind of surrealism that makes you sink lower and lower in your seat, wondering whether to make a dash for the exit.

If you do sit it out, though, there's some enjoyment to be had in spotting the comedy references - to The Goodies, The Lavender Hill Mob, even Charlie Chaplin's City Lights.

But I'm afraid that serves mainly to remind us what good comedy is, and what this isn't.

Three decades of spot-on spoofery, zesty playing and cinematic ambition are celebrated in this two-hour tribute. It was 2 November 1982 when we first heard a cheesy organ rendition of Quando Quando Quando, and saw a symbolic bomb fall on middle England. They've been falling ever since.

Ahead of Wednesday's new Comic Strip, G.O.L.D. plucks the highlights and jaw-dropping back-stage stories (the near deaths, the seat-of-pants filming) from a 40-film catalogue.

Healthily disrespectful contributors include Jeff Beck and Harry Enfield, there's a smattering of unseen footage, plus location revisits and Jim Broadbent's hilarious take on Jack Regan from The Sweeney.

Stephen Mangan bags title role in Postman Pat movie

Stephen Mangan, Rupert Grint, David Tennant and Jim Broadbent are set to deliver first-class vocal performances in a big-screen 3D Postman Pat animation.