Bernard and the Genie

Bernard Bottle (Alan Cumming) is on top of the world. He has just found two paintings for his work that are worth 50 million pounds. His boss even sends the limo to pick him up and bring him to work that day. He goes into to chat with his boss, Charles Pinkworht (Rowan Atkinson) and is fired for suggesting they give half the money back to the to old women who owns the paintings. He gets back to his flat and calls up his fiancée only to discover that she is sleeping with his best friend. There is some sad music playing and suddenly there is no  more stuff in his flat. Either he had to sell it to buy food, or the repo guys came and took his furniture, but he is left with nothing. Nothing except a lamp.

His ex bought him the old lamp, he being an art dealer and all, and when he wipes some dirt off of it, a genie pops out. At first Josephus the Genie (Lenny Henry) tries to kill Bernard, but as soon as Bernard say the magic words (i.e.. "I wish you would stop trying to kill me") Josephus stops and they get to talking. Apparently Josephus was sleeping around with a wizard's daughter and the wizard (John Gabriel) curses him by making him a genie in a lamp.

The two new friends go around town having fun on Josephus' flying carpet. They watch movies and eat food (a lot of food) and Bernard makes wishes. He has an unlimited amount of wishes I guess. At one point he wishes for the Mona Lisa and then is arrested by the police for stealing it. But that's okay, because he just wishes that  it happened differently and it does.

Getting down to business, Bernard wishes that Charles Pinkworth donated 100 million pounds of his money to the Queen and that his best friend and ex were arrested for possession with intent to sell. More importantly he wishes that Josephus was back home in his own time, 2000 years ago.

As you can see there is no actual plot to speak of. Man finds lamp, has fun, thwarts enemies, the end. It was cute, though, and very funny. The scene where Pinkworth is confronted by the media asking him why he donated so much money was priceless, you just knew the instant he was off camera he was going to cry.

There is a blatant historical mistake when Josephus is talking about hanging around with Jesus when he was performing miracles, but then asks what happened to Julius Caesar considering Caesar was killed  in 40 BC. The two were like 70 years apart and I really don't think the Josephus was 70.

Also there is the whole space-time conundrum where if Bernard send Josephus back into the past, then he was never there in the present meaning nothing in the movie happened and there was no reason to send Josephus into the past....  but whatever it was still amusing.

Grade: 6/10