Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2238 in DVD
• Released on: 2003-02-10
• Rating: Suitable for 15 years and over
• Aspect ratio: 1.78:1
• Number of discs: 2
• Formats: Box set, Dubbed, PAL, Special Edition, Widescreen
• Original language: English, Italian, Russian
• Subtitled in: English, German, Dutch, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Swedish, Danish, Norwegian, Finnish, Polish
• Number of discs: 2
• Running time: 103 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
This 1988 comedy starred and was scripted by John Cleese and directed by Charles Crichton, veteran Ealing Comedy director. After 1986's Clockwise--in which he played a manic loser similar to Basil Fawlty--A Fish Called Wanda saw Cleese opting for a more sympathetic lead role. Cleese plays Archie Leach (Cary Grant's real name), a barrister living a typically English life of quiet desperation, who falls prey to the American charms of Jamie Lee Curtis. Posing as a law student, she's actually involved in a diamond robbery with psychotic but occasionally clueless Kevin Kline ("The London Underground is not a revolutionary movement!") and Michael Palin, an animal rights' activist. A Fish Called Wanda is, typically of Cleese, well constructed but the romantic heart of the movie softens it a little. It was intended as a satire on Anglo-American differences but most people remember it for a running joke involving squashed dogs, the chips up Palin's nose and the scene where Cleese is hung out of a window by his ankles. The same cast reassembled for 1997's vastly inferior Fierce Creatures.--David Stubbs

Amazon.co.uk Review
A Fish Called Wanda was the blockbuster which proved that John Cleese could be a movie star in his own right. Directed by the Veteran Charles Crichton, who made the 1951 Ealing Comedies classic The Lavender Hill Mob, Wanda combined Ealing-comedy capers and Basil Fawlty-esque farce with contemporary big-screen swearing and black comedy. The plot develops in classic film noir style as Cleese's lawyer, Archie Leech, gets sucked into the double-crossing aftermath of a London diamond heist.

For sound box-office reasons, British comedies often sport an American star and here Cleese delivers not only Jamie Lee Curtis as a smooth operating femme fatale, but Kevin Kline as her idiotic, and insanely jealous lover (for which he won a Best Supporting Actor Oscar). Pushing the limits of bad taste is Michael Palin's animal-loving Ken, who in the film's best running gag attempts to murder an old lady, only to slay her beloved pet dogs. Other highlights include Palin as a man with two chips up his nose and Cleese showing the world a different sort of "Full Monty". One of the funniest British films ever made, A Fish Called Wanda was followed by Fierce Creatures (1997), which reunited the lead cast and claimed to be an "equal" not a "sequel", but sadly wasn't. --Gary S Dalkin

Special Features

• Audio Commentary by John Cleese
  
• New documentary - Something Fishy
  
• Deleted scenes (with introduction by John Cleese)
  
• Original featurettes
  
• Theatrical trailer
  
• Photo Gallery
  
• Easter Eggs: The Key to Wanda’s Heart, John Cleese’s thoughts on the USA, Jamie Lee Curtis’ Halloween momento
  
• Trivia Track
  
• Dolby 5.1

Customer Reviews

Delightfully brilliant
To make a comedy that can be lauded with the comment 'absolutely hilarious' isn't an easy thing to do. It's not so difficult, however, when you are one of the funniest men on god's green earth; and the extremely talented John Cleese has certainly managed to write a fine piece of comedy here. Teaming up with Monty Python buddy Michael Palin and Ealing studios director Charles Crichton, these talented comedians have managed to create a film that is most certainly one of the funniest; laugh per minute and lasting hilarity when it's over, movies ever made. The plot is taken straight from the classic Ealing comedy era (no wonder it works so well) and it follows four crooks that have stolen a bunch of jewels and now decide to double cross one another to take the loot solely for themselves. The plot thickens when the female of the bunch decides that the best way to get the loot would be to get close to a grassed-up co-conspirator's barrister; John Cleese.

Aside from an inch-perfect screenplay, A Fish Called Wanda also benefits from a fine cast of actors to deliver it. John Cleese steals every scene he's in, as you might expect, and he more than justifies his reputation as one of, maybe even the, finest British comedy actor ever. He is joined by a talented pair of Americans; Kevin Kline and Jamie Lee Curtis, along with, as mentioned, his fellow Python Michael Palin. Kline is certainly one of the most underrated actors working today, and his comic timing in this movie is right on the money. Makes you wonder how much better he could have been used over the years. "Scream Queen" Jamie Lee Curtis also does well in the title role; and Michael Palin obviously knows his way round a comedy script. The jokes in the film come thick and fast, and I can't think of a single one that didn't work. It's the big gags that are the real stand out of the movie, though, and one in particular that sees Kevin Kline trying to explain to Cleese's wife what he's doing in their home is absolutely priceless. I nearly fell of my chair laughing. This film is a must see.

A brilliant microcosm of the best of film comedy!
If you want a very funny film, with lots of deep belly laughs, and some more subtle jokes thrown in too, watch this film. If you want a plot that with more intriguing twists and turns than Spaghetti Junction, watch this film. If you want a romantic comedy involving lust, passion and toenail clippings, watch this film. Maybe you just love animals, or Monty Python, Kevin Kline or Jamie Lee Curtis. Anglophiles and Anglophobes could equally be entralled by the diversity offered in this rare gem of a film. I am yet to meet anyone who has not enjoyed this film. (Well, appart from Yorkshire Terrier devotees, but I feel that they may be in a minority) If have not already done so, watch it now. Just go with me on this one - you won't regret it.

A Fabulously Madcap Farce
John Cleese, of Monty Python fame, co-wrote the screenplay for this hilarious comedy caper along with director Charles Crichton, who also directed "The Lavender Hill Mob." Cleese is totally irreverent and has absolutely no clue as to the meaning of political correctness. Everyone and everything is a target for satire. Cleese also performs here one of the most side-splitting stripteases I have ever seen. I literally doubled-over with laughter!

A twenty million dollar jewelry heist is pulled off in London's Hatton Gardens by four eccentric misfits, two Brits and two Americans. George, (Tom Georgeson), is the ringleader, the man who masterminded the theft. He is the only one who knows where the jewels are hidden. His partners in crime include animal lover, Ken Pile, (Michael Palin), a socially inept bumbler with a stuttering problem. He loves his goldfish, Wanda, (named for the movie's heroine), with the passion most attach to their significant other. Wanda Gershwitz, (Jamie Lee Curtis), is George's girlfriend, who uses her formidable seduction techniques to get what she wants, and she wants all the money! Wanda finagles to bring Otto West, (Kevin Kline), into the gang, telling the others he is her brother - although like most other men in the film, he is her lover. And Kline is brilliant as the manic, Nietzche-reading, ex-CIA agent and Anglophobe. He is a self-styled intellectual, but is so stupid that he thinks the London Underground is a political movement. As Wanda remarks, "He's so dumb he thought the Gettysburg Address was where Lincoln lived."

The ploys, dirty tricks and double-crosses Otto and Wanda use against their partners, to prevent them from receiving a share of the loot, are classic. When George's lawyer, Archie, (John Cleese), falls in love with Wanda, her formidable skills at juggling men are seriously challenged. Cleese brings an endearing romantic touch to the smitten Archie. The situation grows more and more convoluted and the laughs build right along with the escalation. Otto is extremely jealous of any man who looks twice at Wanda, and obviously Archie takes more than two glimpses. Madcap madness!

I don't want to disclose any more of the plot here, but "A Fish Called Wanda" contains some of the funniest scenes I have viewed on film. Director Charles Crichton keeps the pace moving at a nice clip and the satire involving the cultural clash between the very proper, if somewhat stuffy English, versus the uncouth, aggressive Yanks is pure delight. At one point, Archie says to Wanda: "Do you have any idea what it's like to be English? We're all terrified by embarrassment. That's why we're all dead!"

This flaky farce is a must see! A definite 5 star film.
JANA