The critics and I don’t agree on this one. Steve Coogan’s new movie entitled The Trip to Italy costarring Rob Brydon has been hailed as excellent but I found it a bit of a disappointment. For the $9.50 admission fee (I’m a senior) I was expecting a culinary and visual feast of amazing food and stunning scenery of the wonderful sights including the Amalfi coast. What I saw was protracted intellectual conversation drawn out in various restaurants while the pair enjoyed assorted courses of Italian food. Beginning in the north with meals of wild game and finishing up near Naples we did indeed see genuine chefs preparing the food for which Italy is famous but we had to endure rather long verbal sparring sessions trying to follow the complicated assortment of British accents as the duo did brilliant imitations of such famous actors as Michael Caine, Hugh Grant and Sean Connery.

The movie dragged in the beginning over a particularly long lunch while we acquainted ourselves with the characters and the vistas photographed while they were driving their Mini convertible down narrow roads and streets. Many of the early scenes were filmed on an overcast day so the beauty of the mountains and countryside was not truly represented. I particularly loved the scenes in Pompeii as that was one of my favourite spots when I visited Italy.

I suggest you wait ’til it comes on television. If you have a large screen in high-def, you’ll save yourself a chunk of change for admission and overpriced popcorn. But that’s just one Boomer’s opinion.