Seeing no other Epinions on this turkey, I thought I'd share my pain at having viewed this dead carcass.
"Private Eyes" casts Don Knotts and Tim Conway as Inspector Winship and Dr. Tart in a supposedly comic parody of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Inspector Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson.
The uninspired story starts out with the murders of Lord and Lady Morley, whose car is driven into a lake outside their mansion...with them in it. Soon Conway and Knotts, sent by the Yard to investigate, are bumbling around the mansion, dealing with the Morleys' strange servants. Then one by one, the servants too are apparently being killed, and their bodies disappearing.
As a comedy, "Private Eyes" has no charm whatsoever. It doesn't seem to make any attempt at satire. Winship and Tart are just two dumb klutzes joking their way through this joke of a movie (only those of you who waste your time or -- heaven forbid -- spend any money aren't going to be laughing). And we come to realize that Knotts ("Pleasantville" aside) and Conway are very unappealing movie performers who should stick with television.
The film is written in part by Tim Conway and it's surprising, but the film does not have a single big laugh, just a few (and I mean few) chuckles. Some of the jokes are old, some of them are just plain bad. Much of the humor is altogether predictable. For example, early in the film Conway and Knotts stop at a gas station. We watch as Knotts leaves a lit cigar on top of their car. We get an unnecessary closeup of the cigar, so we know it's going to start a fire. We are expecting it. And when it does happen, it's not spontaneous, and therefore the scene is not funny.
Watching "Private Eyes" one wonder how director Mel Brooks might have handled it. Yet there is simply no comparison between this movie and a Brooks comedy. There is none of Brooks truly inspired outrageousness, none of his biting satire, none of his controlled pace or rhythm. Even when Brooks went down the tubes with a film like "High Anxiety", it still seemed to be an exceedingly gallant failure. But this film just seems to be a cold-blooded Hollywood product, a vehicle for Conway and Knotts, a film that is, in my opinion, much worse than "High Anxiety".
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