How To Get Ahead In Advertising - DVD Review

Kurosawa’s first British film... Only kidding. Let’s start again: two heads aren’t necessarily better than one in this heavy-handed satire about a venal advertising executive plagued by a talking boil. Reunited two years after Withnail And I, Bruce Robinson and Richard E Grant flail to find a cohesive tone for their tale, the director’s pertinent diatribes about capitalism and mass consumerism superceded by strident hectoring. Still, Grant’s OTT performance must rank among his best, while there are enough flashes of surreal brilliance to make you rue Robinson’s subsequent disappearing act.