The Pink Panther Strikes Again (1976) User Reviews

Superb comedy with Peter Sellers as one man show accompanied by an excessive Herbert Lom

[ma-cortes · 7/10 · 29 May 2006]

After making life intolerable for clumsy Inspector Closeau (Peter Sellers) , former Chief Inspector Charles Dreyfuss (overacting Herbert Lom) goes nutty and is interned in asylum . One time escaped from the mental asylum , the mentally ill Dreyfuss tries to destroy the world by means of a ray-laser . Besides , he hires a group of hit men to kill Jacques Closeau who's gone to England to investigate the abduction an eminent scientific forced to build a fantastic machine and being helped by British policemen (Colin Blakely , Leonard Rossiter).

This release is the fourth part of Closeau series and an enjoyable comedy starred by the great Peter Sellers as the inept and bungler Inspector of the French Surete . The movie gets entertaining and hilarious moments here and there . This slapstick contains funny scenes and never slowdown . Herbert Lom parodying his ¨Phantom of opera¨ personage is excellent . There appear as secondaries the usual series , such as Burt Kwouk as Cato , Grahame Stark and a gorgeous Lesley Anne Down who replaced Maud Adams . Omar Sharif , who had just played with director Blake Edwards on " The Tamarind Seed " has a brief cameo as an eastern murderer . Lively and atmospheric music by habitual Henry Mancini and magnificent opening and ending cartoon titles by Richard Williams . Colorful cinematography Harry Waxman , being mostly shot in Europe : Paris , France , Bavaria , Germany , Ireland and Shepperton Studios , Surrey , England . The film was well penned and directed , as always , by Blake Edwards . Several chuckles and gags , the result of which is one of the funniest from series along with ¨A shot in dark¨ , ¨Return of pink panther¨, and ¨Revenge of pink panther¨. The flick will appeal to pink panther series and Peter Sellers fans . This is arguably one of the best pink panther . Two thumbs up.

"The maddest of them all"

[Steffi_P · 8/10 · 11 October 2011]

This was the fourth movie in the Pink Panther franchise and, despite the title, the titular diamond that was the namesake of the original and The Return of… has nothing to do with this entry. By now, Pink Panther had come to mean not gimmick for the sake of a comedy plot, but the world of the wonderfully inept Inspector Clouseau, and a vibrant brand of latter-day screen slapstick.

One of the most consistently brilliant elements of the earlier pictures was Clouseau's relationship with the increasingly demented Dreyfuss. For The Pink Panther Strikes Again, this relationship becomes the central premise of the whole movie. As such the scope is there for more-or-less continuous comedy with very little else to complicate it. Apart from, that is, a James Bond spoof slant, with Dreyfuss taking on the role of the eccentric super villain. This in turn allows for some large-scale actiony gags, reminiscent of the wilder escapades of silent comics Buster Keaton and Harold Lloyd. Peter Sellers's stunt double Joe Dunne received a lot of work here.

This also allows for a greater part to be taken in comic staging by director Blake Edwards. A Shot in the Dark was nearly all Sellers, and that was very good in its way, but for Strikes Again we really get to see Edwards's outsize and somewhat surreal comic creations at their most unbridled, from the perfectly-timed three way fight between Clouseau, Cato and Dreyfuss to Clouseau's bungled attempts to get into Dreyfuss's castle. But Edwards still has a way with the smaller comedy confection, as usual his trademark tactic being to make almost everything invisible to the audience, showing just enough to make a gag work. For example, there is a very funny set-up in a public toilet where we only see the feet at the bottom of the cubicles.

There's a lot of verbal comedy too in the Blake Edwards/Frank Waldman screenplay, which is of a middling quality and gets a little tiresome at times. But as we see for example in the scene where Sellers interrogates the professor's house staff, Sellers and Edwards have brilliant timing in punctuating a talky scene with physical gags. Occasionally the humour gets just a little too silly, and there are a lot of clichés – such as the "that is not my dog" line, which I'm sure predates this movie, and the stepping-on-a-rake gag, which predates cinema.

But perhaps this latter is a deliberate tribute to the staples of slapstick. It becomes apparent, as Clouseau inadvertently survives numerous assassination attempts, that he succeeds purely by virtue of the fact that he is a slapstick hero and a wake of chaos must follow him wherever he goes. It is a kind of meta-comedy. And herein lies one of the slightly disappointing things about this movie. Often Clouseau is saved, not directly by his incompetence, but by sheer luck. When a giant pretzel stops him getting skewered by a killer disguised as a buxom wench, it is funny, but it is not really a Clouseau gag. It seems, with Sellers's lessening interest in the franchise (not to mention the heart condition which kept the aforementioned Mr Dunne employed), that perhaps the character around whom the whole thing revolved was beginning to be watered down.

The best of the Pink Panther movies still holds up over 40 years later!

[mark.waltz · 8/10 · 18 July 2018]

Yes, Blake Edwards keeps repeating the same gag over and over. How many times do former Chief Inspector Dreyfus and the current Chief Inspector Clouseau have to fall into the water? In Dreyfus's case, it's a duck pond, and in Clouseau's case, it's a castle moat, but I count at least eight in this movie. In the end of "Return of the Pink Panther", the audience saw Dreyfus in a mental institution which is where he is preparing for a hearing to be released from here, every day in every way "feeling better and better". It's obvious that in a world without Clouseau, Dreyfus would be a completely sane man, but like that one co-worker nobody can stand (but can't get rid of), Clouseau is the Christmas Fruit Cake that keeps coming and coming every year. Clouseau makes the mistake of coming to see Dreyfus on the day of his hearing and makes the matters worse, driving Dreyfus back over the cuckoo's nest and more determined than ever to kill Clouseau, and destroy the world in the process if he has to!

References to Lom's earlier roles as Napoleon and the Phantom of the Opera are made here as part of a loving tribute, and as a result, Lom pretty much ends up stealing the film, reminding me of one of those delicious old movie serial villains you hiss at but somehow admire for their raw determination to reach an evil goal. There's no pink panther diamond here, only the visual of the pink panther in the opening and closing credits haunting Clouseau through some very clever movie moments, one having Mr. Pink in Julie Andrews' Maria Von Trapp on the hillside postulant dress. Andrews makes a brief vocal appearance, having recorded "Until You Love Me" and seeing her voice played back at a different scene for the drag bar sequence with Michael Robbins in hideous drag lip-sinking to the record as he makes his moves on Sellers. It's a rare 70's glimpse into a gay establishment, filled with stereotypes yet not offensively done. The yellow face references to Cato (Burt Kwouk) remain and might draw some awkwardness, but it's part of the period, and who can deny the hysterical antics between Clouseau and his hysterically funny, if violent, valet?

The scenes at the Oktoberfest come off very well too, with a German song that sounds like "Booby Bundy" playing in the background as a large hitman in drag with daggers in his falsies stalks Sellers. Omar Sharif makes a brief cameo as the Egyptian hit man and is very funny, although I found Lesley-Anne Down's appearances as the sexy Russian spy distracting and the one element that slows down the movie to a hault. The castle sequences are hysterical, especially the famous bit with aged hotel clerk Harold Berens, Sellers in disguise as a dentist, and Lom's attempts at torturing one of his kidnapping victims. Some audiences today might find the erasing of the United Nations building a little too close to the destruction of the World Trade Center 25 years after this was made, but representations of some political figures of this time (Gerald Ford, Henry Kissinger) are very funny. This is a goof-ball picture if there ever was one, and one of the best comedies of the 1970's that stands out from the other weaker entries in the series. Edwards went all out with this one, and even if some of the gags just seem desperate, there's a charm to them that can't be denied.

Clouseau and Cato perform

[desfritz · 27 November 2001]

Of the Pink Panther series of films, this is the best with the possible exception of the original. Clouseau and Cato outdo themselves in the hide and seek game they play in each film. In this one however they have learnt from the mishaps in previous films and set the tone for a truly hilarious turning of events. The visit to the Oktoberfest takes a real comic view of the Cold War but Clouseau's inspection of the Fassbender house is even better. Throughout the film the storyline twists and turns and together with the background tunes combine terrifically -- see Sellers assault on Mondschein castle! The lunatic Dreyfuss is at his craziest from start to finish, how did he get his eye to twitch so much? The Inspector's love interest played by the very sexy Lesley Ann Down adds a further dimension to the plot with James Bond overtones. A film you can watch again and again.

Pretty fair.

[gridoon · 7/10 · 28 May 2000]

This fifth "Pink Panther" entry is a practically plotless collection of gags. Such comedies are always inevitably uneven, and this one is no exception. It contains at least one scene than never fails to bring tears of laughter to my eyes (the interrogation at the house of the kidnapped scientist, with Sellers at his best) and a wonderful animated title sequence, and it remains generally amusing throughout. But it does have its share of lulls, too, and some overly predictable sight gags that aren't likely to impress even the kids. Sometimes this is a very funny film, but it misses the mark now and then, as well.

The Genius Of Peter Sellers

[jhclues · 10/10 · 3 January 2001]

The inimitable Peter Sellers strikes again as Chief Inspector Jacques Clouseau, in this fourth installment of the classic `Pink Panther' series, `The Pink Panther Strikes Again,' directed by Blake Edwards. Given the fact that the assessment of comedy is intrinsically subjective, this film is arguably laugh for laugh and sight gag for sight gag the funniest of the five (followed closely by the second of the series, the hilarious farce, `A Shot In The Dark). In this one, former Chief Inspector Dreyfus (Herbert Lom) is about to be released from the mental hospital-- in which he has resided since being driven crazy by Clouseau-- when on the very afternoon of his hearing he is visited by none other than Clouseau himself, who has come to speak on behalf of his former boss. Suffice to say that by the time Clouseau is through `helping,' he is driven from the premises by the relapsed, raving madman, Dreyfus. And it's only the beginning of the inept French Inspector's antics that, before it is over, will include a trip to the Ocktoberfest, encounters with a dozen hit-men from around the world, a beautiful Russian spy named Olga (Lesley-Anne Down), a surprise Egyptian spy (who will remain nameless) and a one-man assault on a castle. As Laurel and Hardy proved so many times before, for every action there is a reaction; a theorem of which proof is unequivocally provided here by the relationship between Sellers and Lom. This was the film in which Edwards and his stars not only further devised, but honed to perfection, their foolproof formula for laughs: After the `first wave' of hilarity provided by Sellers, it is followed up-- in just enough instances to be totally effective-- by Lom's reaction to 1.) Sellers directly (as in the first, classic scene at the mental hospital), or 2.) Lom's reaction to Seller's antics as they are related to him by a third party. It's a one-two punch that never fails and which, in effect, derives twice the fun from a single gag. And it's brilliant. But at the end of the day, it must be noted that there is one element above all else that accounts for the success of this film, and that, of course, is the Man himself, Peter Sellers. Sellers must be regarded as-- if not `the,' then at least one of the-- funniest actors ever to grace the silver screen. There was no end to the ways he could make you laugh; from the subtlest expression-- an eye averted or perhaps the slight raising of an eyebrow-- to the broadest slapstick, it was all within his personal domain, and he was the Master. Physically, practically all he had to do to get a laugh was show up; consider the scene in which he arrives at the hospital to visit Dreyfus: As he saunters across the lawn of the vast grounds surrounding the buildings, a croquet mallet and ball lying to one side catches his eye; there is just the slightest hesitation in his step, the subtlest change of expression in his eyes and the merest inclination of the head. And there, in that briefest of moments upon the screen, you know-- beyond the shadow of a doubt-- what is about to transpire. And you're right; a moment later Clouseau has the mallet in his hand and his foot on the ball, and even as it's happening-- just as you knew it would in that split second before it did-- he has you on the floor laughing. That was the gift-- and the genius-- of Peter Sellers. Was every film he made a classic? A great film? Of course not; but you would be hard put to find a single performance of his, even in a bad film (Like 1970's `There's A Girl In My Soup'), that did not embody that unique spark that defined him. It was certainly alive in his portrayal of Clouseau (possibly the definitive Seller's character), and in retrospect, what a shame it seems that there were only five `Panther' movies ever made. But so it is, and shall ever be. The supporting cast includes Burt Kwouk (as the ever faithful and attacking manservant, Cato), Andre Maranne (Francois), Colin Blakely (Alec Drummond), Leonard Rossiter (Inspector Quinlan), Richard Vernon (Dr. Fassbender), Briony McRoberts (Margo) and Michael Robbins (Jarvis). A funny movie that showcases one of Cinema's truly unique and funny actors, `The Pink Panther Strikes Again' is a side-splitting, fun movie you can watch over and over and never grow tired of. The best of the series, it stands as a glowing tribute to the comedic genius of Peter Sellers. I rate this one 10/10.

For me the standout and best of them all

[awdboosted95 · 7/10 · 9 July 2022]

It all came together in this one, even the beginning was brilliant and one of the best acts in the entire series and noteworthy this one is great start to finish right down to final scene no filler crap in this one unlike others.

It starts with Lom's character Dreyfus which is at its peak here and it really helps elevate this one, a joy to watch him and go to the extremes he does. Same goes for Cato and the attacks, these are just awesome fun and at a whole different level here compared to prior outings, and thus much more enjoyable! Clouseau is such a cruel and ruthless bastard when it comes to his poor friend Cato its hilarious and great writing here!

Dare I say Clouseau himself was now more refined here also, many standout scenes but some favs here are: the Hunchback scene (notable also the disguises were at another level here), him trying to get into the Castle in hilarious ways, "does your daog bite" (the thick accent and the scene are great), he screws up many of the people's names in funny ways, the numerous assassins that come after him and priceless here the dentist bit with the anesthesia.

Clouseau once again proves in hilarious ways no one can accidentally foil bad guys like him and he is next to impossible to kill. The slapstick here was not quite as telegraphed as prior shows so it comes out better here. Overall just a great flick 7.5/10.

Hilarious from start to finish

[Sleepin_Dragon · 10/10 · 3 June 2017]

Without a shadow of a doubt this was my favourite film as a child, I would watch it over and over again. Sometimes things can be remembered with rose tinted glasses, not in this case. Having not seen it for a while I watched it, and belly laughed the whole way through. I hadn't realised how much it felt like a Bond spoof, with our calamitous detective in the Bond role and Dreyfus the crazed villain.

The opening scenes are insanely funny, and coupled with that cheerful music, the whole thing starts off in style. The scenes where Clouseau interviews the staff are my favourites, with Shalk the Gardner, Mrs Leverlilly etc, incredibly funny.

So many stars, even a small appearance from the late great Omar Sharif. Michael Robbins is fabulous as the butler and transvestite singer. Peter Sellers of course steals the show, legendary of course, but only he could play the part.

Pure magic from start to finish.

One of the better 'Panther' outings.

[vip_ebriega · 7/10 · 15 March 2007]

My Take: Sellers is still strong in this sillier, but just as hilarious, offering.

This is one of my favorite entries in the "Pink Panther" series of films. Peter Sellers is always in his most hilarious as clumsy Inspector Clouseau. Herbert Lom, Lesley Ann-Down and Burt Kwouk give superb supporting roles. And Blake Edwards makes everything hilarious as it should. This one ranks one of the best. It features one of Clouseau's clumsiest, the wonderfully hilarious karate sequence between Cato and Clouseau and a wonderfully exhibited comedy plot, about Clouseau's former Chief Inspector Charles Dreyfuss cracking up and finds a sinister way to find Clouseau and uses a large laser to threaten the world to give away Clouseau. Though not A SHOT IN THE DARK, this is one of the funnier outings in the entertaining, if totally uneven PINK PANTHER series.

Rating: ***1/2 out of 5.

Hilarity and good fun

[InzyWimzy · 10/10 · 17 November 2002]

Inspector Clouseau...Commissioner Dreyfuss...Gerald Ford. What don't you have in this movie?

Funny film to watch again and again. The chemistry is perfect between Peter Sellers and Herbert Lom. There are so many jokes and laughs throughout, I usually pick up something new after each viewing, especially Clouseau's accent. The castle scene with the dentist visit has got to be one of the funniest moments recorded on film. You'd swear there really was nitrous oxide in the room. I always get a chuckle from the apartment scene in the start. I'd never knew how funny the use of slow motion could be. Timing of the jokes are crazier than a set of "parallels". Add Mancini's music which seems to fit each scene quite nicely, thank you.

Probably my favorite of the Pink Panther movies (next to A Shot in the Dark), you have to love Peter Seller's portrayal of the "hit and miss" wonder named Clouseau. Plus, Lesley Anne Down looks great as Olga and makes me appreciate a nice fur coat. Definitely a keeper.

Probably The Best In The Series

[Theo Robertson · 7/10 · 6 January 2005]

THE PINK PANTHER movies ? Started off well but then soon outlived their welcome in my opinion , I mean a French policeman with a silly accent , just how much milage can you get out of that ? But this 1976 offering is probably the best in the series simply down to the fact the best laughs are darkly comical rather than slapstick , an early example with Clouseau asking " How ? " to be followed a couple of minutes by a laugh out loud scene featuring a couple of old ladies . There's also a very funny sub plot of the world's best assassins trying to bump off Clouseau which includes several funny scenes . I don't feel any guilty at laughing at people dying in this movie

There are some weaker points like an overlong scene where Inspector Quinlan gives a shocked look which is embarrassing rather than amusing , and as some of the other people on this page has mentioned the movie does feel rather episodic at some points but I have no hesitation in saying this is Blake Edwards funniest comedy

More death and destruction at the hands of Inspector Clouseau

[blanche-2 · 8/10 · 6 October 2007]

"The Pink Panther Strikes Again" is an apt title for this hilarious 1976 film starring Peter Sellers and Herbert Lom. In this story, Dreyfus, driven mad by Clouseau, escapes from the mental asylum. Determined to destroy Clouseau once and for all, he kidnaps the inventor of a Doomsday device along with his daughter. This machine makes buildings disappear without a trace, and can do the same to people and whole countries. The world has 7 days to kill Clouseau or Dreyfus, who has already used it to destroy the United Nations in a dazzling display of power, will turn it on the world. When the inventor says something about using it on Clouseau, Drefus replies that to Clouseau, this doomsday machine would be as effective as a water pistol. Yes, it's true, the man is a menace with an uncanny way of killing and trashing anything around him and walking out unscathed.

There are too many funny bits to go into, but Clouseau trying on his hunchback disguise and overinflating it so that he floats outside is great; Clouseau attempting to get into the castle is wonderful; there's the drag club scene, the scenes with Olga (Lesley-Anne Down) - well, the movie will keep you laughing. And, if you're like me, it's just what the doctor ordered.

Literally Insane!

[AaronCapenBanner · 7/10 · 6 September 2013]

Fourth time out for Peter Sellers as Inspector Clouseau finds himself the target of multiple assassins, hired by his former boss, Chief Inspector Dreyfuss, who has gone insane and kidnaps a scientist and his daughter to help him build a doomsday weapon, so he can ransom the world! Preposterous sequel, to the say the least, but also one of the funniest in the series, loaded with inspired jokes and sight gags, not to mention crazy disguises that Clouseau wears. Herbert Lom especially has a field day as the gleefully crazy Dreyfuss, only happy when trying to kill Clouseau. Despite the ending, this wouldn't be the last time we see him either...

I guess my taste has changed

[irishm · 5/10 · 10 October 2016]

We thought this was hilarious when it was run endlessly on HBO in the early 1980's, and we quoted it all the time: "Does your deug baht?" "Do you have a reum?". I was looking forward to seeing it again recently, but thought it fell rather flat when I finally did. It has its moments, and Herbert Lom is entertaining as "the lunatic Dreyfus", but it's not the gem I remember. (How's this for a line I bet they wish they could take back in a screwball comedy: on the topic of the disintegration of the UN, Dreyfus screams, "I want a crater! Wreckage! Twisted metal! Something the world will never forget!" In another couple decades the Twin Towers would fill that request for real.) The end picks up a little bit after a sagging middle (I thought that bedroom ambush between Clouseau and Cato would never end), so it's worth hanging on to get to the finale which has some clever stuff in it. Not as good as I remember it, though.

Kato! I'm on the Phone!!!

[gazzo-2 · 24 October 2000]

Oh my lord...I never laughed as hard as I did when I first saw this one....What a scream. A terrifically funny flick indeed. Where do you begin? The plunger arrow on Lom's forehead-'Kill! Kill! Kill!', the fast and furious fight with Kato, complete with floating Hunchback of Notre Dame sequence and air-hose escape scene...oh my God....Love the laughing gas scene with Clouseau and Lom...oh that one is priceless.

Lesley Anne Down as a fur coat and little else garbed Russian Spy is worth a watch too. I liked her then, I do now.

Essentially you can't go wrong with this one; it's the best in the series and makes me laugh very, very hard.

And yeah, 'Ford and Kissinger' are great too..

***1/2 outta **** oh this one is a scream

One of the funniest Pink Panther films - if slightly uneven

[gridoon2024 · 7/10 · 16 December 2017]

One of the funniest films in the "Pink Panther" series: the best parts (the Poirot-style interrogation, Clouseau's attempts to enter the castle, the laughing gas, "does your dog bite?", "it was hard in the Resistance but not as hard as it is now", etc.) are hilarious, there is considerable cleverness in many of the elaborately staged gags, and although there are dry stretches, they are fewer than in the other series entries. Peter Sellers is in good form, and Herbert Lom is every bit his equal in laugh-getting. The cinephilic animated credits sequence is wonderful. *** out of 4.

My favorite Panther

[MacBobby · 10/10 · 25 February 2006]

I think "Strikes Again" is the most accomplished of the series.

Clouseau's attempts to enter the castle are just impossible to describe: so hilarious I still laugh whenever I recall the scenes. Not to mention the short conversations with the hotel owner (including the now classic "That is not my dog"), and many many others. This movie's probably the best Peter Seller performance, I think. This guy was such a genius: his accent, his acting and his expressions are all unique and still alive.

I can't understand why anyone would want to make new Pink Panther movies now that Peter Sellers is gone.

Very funny but too comical in style.

[Chinesevil · 7/10 · 25 January 2022]

Continues the Panther series that from the first episode is more and more like a movie by Laurel and Hardy, and less and less a movie with a refined humor. However, despite the ingenuity and the repeated gags, the excellent cast and the excellent music make a lot of fun.

The best one out of the series.

[Boba_Fett1138 · 9/10 · 3 May 2008]

This is just one of those movies that, no matter how many times I've watched it, is an hilarious comedy that genuinely makes me laugh.

What I often love about Blake Edwards' comedies is his almost cartoon like approach of it. This is like a life action road runner/Wile E. Coyote movie. Along with "The Great Race" this is perhaps his most cartoon like comedy. The slapstick and timing of it in this movie is amazing and it of course also obviously work out due to the comical brilliance of Peter Sellers.

Out of all the Pink Panther movies this is the one with the most laughs and classic comical moments in it. Great moments such as the slow motion fight between Clouseau & Cato (it's the best Clouseau vs. Cato fights out of the whole series), in which Dreyfus also somehow gets involved, the Oktoberfest sequence, the questioning of the staff, Clouseau trying to enter the château, Clouseau disguised as a dentist and I'm sure I'm forgetting many more great sequences. It are all moments that just bound to make you laugh, even if you really don't want to.

For the comedy and the story itself is actually quite lame and predictable. You can often see things coming from miles away but this seriously doesn't make it any less funny to watch. Perhaps its even somehow part of the reason why it works out so incredibly hilarious. It's obvious that Blade Edwards and Peter Sellers both were lovers and inspired by the slapstick comedies of the '20's and early '30's. This movie features the same type of comical approach but not in an old fashioned way. The Clouseau character is still 'modern' and the approach original, even if it all has done somewhere else before.

Of course most credit goes to Peter Sellers. He was a brilliant comedian who never tried to be funny but simply just was funny. The way he handles all of the comedy within this movie is just brilliant. It are not just the antics but also the accent and other small subtle things that made him great and turned Chief Insp. Jacques Clouseau into an absolute classic comedy character. Even if you've never seen a Pink Panther movie you still know who Jacques Clouseau is.

But also the other actors deserve credit. Especially Herbert Lom, who just as Sellers doesn't try to be funny and instead plays a mean hateful character, who at the same time is of course totally hilarious. He is especially great in the scenes with Sellers, the two of them had some great interaction and chemistry together.

If you've never seen a Pink Panther movie and you have to see just one, be sure to watch this one. It's the absolute best and most hilarious one!

9/10

http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/

Fun for the whole family!

[ioanpop_ · 7/10 · 19 February 2021]

Despite the low grade, let me tell you, this was an entertaining movie. No doubt about it. The actors seemed to have so much fun during filming. I got the feeling that I was watching a theatrical experience where me and my friends were laughing together. Its true, it did not have the most advance editing and effects and the theme was not impressive but the excision made it all fun to watch. It's not easy to make a comedy, how would've thought that some scrambled dialogue and failed attempts of murder is the key to success? There is not a lot to say about this movie, even if it's not deep and we don't have glimpses of what the characters are thinking, I still love to watch it just because its not meant to tell you something, it's meant to make you smile. I like that!

So much better than the new one

[cyoungjohnson · 10/10 · 20 June 2006]

The Pink Panther Srikes Again is one of the funniest movies I have ever seen. The Pink Panther 2006 was one of the worst movies I have ever seen. Rent Strikes Again instead and enjoy humor that is not forced or faked. It's so brilliant mostly because of Peter Sellers, his believable and not forced delivery. I laughed until I cried. Herbert Lom was also perfection in this movie. Who could ever forget that crazy laugh? I miss Kato in the new versions also. When the French policeman came on as a poor Kato substitute in the 2006 film I was embarrassed for him. How painful the bad accents and bad acting must have been to endure. Beyonce was the worst. I give this movie 10 stars not only because it is the funniest thing I have ever seen, but because it is so much better than the Steve Martin version. Strikes Again is a classic. 2006 Panther is a disgrace.

Striking

[sol- · 7/10 · 30 January 2016]

Radically different from the previous three 'Pink Panther' movies, this popular fourth entry takes the story to absurdist extremes with a now completely mad Chief Inspector Dreyfus escaping from an insane asylum and holding the whole world hostage with a doomsday device, demanding Clouseau's life. The extra screen time that Herbert Lom gets as a result of this plot deflection is welcome given that he was one of the main highlights of the previous two 'Pink Panther' films. The multiple failed attempts by international assassins to be the successful one to kill Clouseau also leads to several funny sequences, the best of which involves some madness in the restrooms at Oktoberfest, which of course Clouseau is completely oblivious to. While his parodying of a megalomaniacal Bond villain is spot-on, something is definitely lost though by having Lom insane from the get-go as there is no delicious gradual descent into madness as in the two earlier films. The film also unsteadily walks a tightrope between absurdist lunacy and simple inane silliness and a number of gags backfire as a result of the filmmakers pushing things too far (the climax in particular is very over-the- top). And yet, for all its detriments, 'Strikes Again' is a hard film not to warm to since the filmmakers show such obvious passion for doing something different with series and as Lom proves himself to be worthy of every extra percentage of screen time that he is given. It is probably a film that is worth giving a spin even if one disliked the first three films -- that's how different it is.

Funniest of them all

[richardofgloucester · 10/10 · 3 June 2020]

My favorite of the Panther series. The scene where Clouseau interrogates the staff is the funniest piece of comedy ever.

A little too weird

[planktonrules · 6/10 · 8 July 2006]

This movie is perhaps a little too weird in that it seems to take the characters from the Pink Panther movies way off the deep end. And while this makes for a very funny movie on the surface, down deep it shows that the series is sputtering a bit. Funny yes, but kind of dumb, too.

Chief Inspector Dreyfus takes center stage in this film as HE is the villain! After years of putting up with Clouseau's imbecility and somehow managing to avoid being killed by Dreyfus, the Chief Inspector has a plan to construct a doomsday weapon and force the rest of the world to kill Clouseau for him! This is very funny and the film abounds with cute scenes--it just is perhaps TOO odd and the film doesn't quite jell. A nice try, though.

Cruddy-looking Clouseau comedy

[moonspinner55 · 4/10 · 9 April 2009]

Peter Sellers returns to famous role as bumbling Chief Inspector Jacques Clouseau for the fourth time (and the second time in the span of 19 months, following 1975's "The Return of the Pink Panther"). Here, the bumbling Clouseau attempts to stop former boss Dreyfus (Herbert Lom) from using a laser beam to decimate parts of the world. Co-writer/director/producer Blake Edwards flogs the audience with idiot comedy, much of it climaxing in the not-hilarious destruction of property--and I wonder how many times Sellers had to fall into the moat before he cried, "Enough already!" Dismaying to see the Clouseau character wind up as a human cartoon, flaying away on occasionally crass or vulgar set-ups. Sellers himself looks fatigued and disinterested, as he and Edwards fail to prod much of this slapstick nonsense into routines worthy of either of them. Followed another year and seven months by "Revenge of the Pink Panther" in 1978. *1/2 from ****