On Falling Short with The Inbetweeners

Successful TV shows that become films get a bad reputation. It is difficult to make something work over two hours that has previously only had to work for thirty minutes. The Inbetweeners is no exception. A well written, very relatable TV show becomes a laboured film that quickly gets repetitive. There are some outstanding comedy sequences, but outside of these the jokes falls flat. As in the TV show, the four main actors manage to inject their teenagers with a layer of pathos that lies just below the blind bravado. Within the TV show, one central idea can be sustained for thirty minutes, but you can’t do that for a feature. Unfortunately the writers did not seem to see the difference and the whole film works within the restricted limits of a very weak story. Definitley funny, in parts, but the comedy cannot disguise what is a poorly written story.