Deciding it could be pushed back no further, MGM has released the winter bomb to end all winter bombs.  The one that will make Curious George look like King Kong.  The one that will make Annapolis look like An Officer and a Gentleman.  The one that will make Big Momma’s House 2, Medea’s Family Reunion, Date Movie, and every other picture with a svelte star wearing a fat suit look like…uh…okay, bad illustration, since there are no good examples of this growing genre.  I’m talking about the oft-delayed The Pink Panther, a movie clearly made for (and probably by) people of the retarded persuasion.  If you enjoy it, odds are you’re missing a chromosome.  Or have an extra one, or something.

It’s awful enough to make anyone with half of a brain believe Peter Sellers, who we learned despised the Panther films in his recent HBO biopic, should be spinning in his grave loud enough for Tchaikovsky to get the news that this movie sucks it hard.  Co-writer Steve Martin, torching his few remaining shreds of credibility, stars as the bumbling police officer Clouseau, who is promoted to Inspector by his chief (Kevin “I’ve Made Just One Decent Film Since My Son Owen Was Born” Kline) to spearhead an investigation into the murder of a soccer coach and the theft of his enormous Pink Panther diamond.  Clouseau is given the gig only because the chief knows he’ll bungle it, which kind of makes Panther a lot like The Producers in more than just the obvious way.

Panther boasts a whole lot of Americans with awful French accents, Brits with awful French accents (this may have been funny in 1963, but it went the way of the Edsel), and authentic French actors who look awfully mortified.  At one point toward the end of the film, Clouseau takes his assistant (Jean Reno) aside and apologizes for embarrassing him.  I shouted, “Too late!”  And just when you’re about to say, “At least it can’t get any worse than this,” Beyoncé’s caterwauling begins.  One shouldn’t enter a Panther film looking for subtlety, but its lack is taken to entirely new levels by director Shawn Levy, helmer of masterworks like Cheaper by the Dozen and Just Married.

1:33 - for occasional crude and suggestive humor and language