In this late-70s comedy curio, Monty Python straight man Graham Chapman once again brings his put-upon Englishman energy to a darkly surreal scenario; here, after being left by his wife, he decides to commit suicide, but after a series of bungled attempts, ends up hiring a rodent-like odd-job man (David Jason) to do the job for him. Before too long, however, he changes his mind – but the odd-job man, unaware, continues his attempts to off Chapman as Chapman tries to clear up the whole crazy situation.
The premise hits just the right note of darkly comic absurdity, and the comedic pedigree of the film is undeniable, with Chapman and his frequent collaborator Bernard McKenna handling the script and British-Hungarian maverick Peter Medak directing. David Jason’s performance as the Odd Job Man is perfectly bizarre, with not a note of Del Boy present at all; Chapman puts in exactly the sort of solid work you’d expect (“more a react-er than an actor”, Medak opines) and there’s plenty of talent filling out the film’s minor parts: Richard O’Brien as a homosexual gangster, Bill Paterson (Fleabag, The Witches 1990) as a pompous cop.
Yet for all that, The Odd Job remains more of a curio than a lost classic. Fans of Monty Python, or of Britain in the 70s in general, ought to check it out once, but the picture is pervaded by hokiness – tired stock sound effects,a tediously whimsical score, and plenty of bad ADR that suggests someone in editing noticed a relative lack of laughs – and worse, there’s an overall atmosphere of astiness that’s hard to shake. A nasty streak is welcome in all the best comedies, but, like the last Python film, Meaning of Life, nastiness seems to be all The Odd Job has left, as if it’s reached a point of such cynicism that there is no point in having any character worth rooting for. Perhaps it has to do with Chapman’s ever-worsening alcoholism, which very much makes it to the screen; in the film’s best line, he tells the bartender, “One more of these and I’ll have rebuilt an entire lemon”, while ordering another drink.
Among the extras here, we get an interview with Peter Medak. Medak is very old and evidently not in perfect health, as you’d expect from a man in his late 80s, really. His interlocutor does seem to express more interest and fondness, and certainly more vivid memory, of the film than Medak himself – which, again, is fair. Though this is a short-ish audio interview and not a commentary, it nonetheless plays over the film for thirty-two minutes, and when it ends the rest of the film plays out as normal. Presumably someone at Severin felt that the interview needed something visual playing to keep it interesting. Other interviews, thankfully, simply play the video footage of the interviewees. We’re fairly lucky in that, though Chapman has long since passed away, so many of the cast and crew are still around to be interviewed. David Jason, 85, participates in a Zoom interview with Medak (“The Odd Job Men”); if you can get past Jason’s air of insincerity, we do learn some interesting tidbits here, such as that Chapman favoured The Who’s Keith Moon for David Jason’s rôle. “The Unusual Work” gives us writer Bernard McKenna (80), sharing reminiscences of the era, sort of a who’s-who of British comedy of the 1970s; “Producer: An Odd Job” features Mark Forstater, 81, who spends rather too much time recapping the plot of The Odd Job and its production details; “The Odd Batch” is a fairly low-quality Zoom interview (the Medak/Jason interview is much higher fidelity) with actor Richard O’Brien (82), who is of course far better known for writing Rocky Horror and/or for presenting The Crystal Maze; Carolyn Seymour, 77 – Medak’s wife at the time the film was made – discusses her small, sexy rôle in “The Naughty Neighbour” and Simon Williams, 79, appears in “Most Peculiar Craft”.
Anyone with enough interest in Python or the 70s to check out The Odd Job ought to get a kick out of these extras, but to general audiences the film’s appeal today is just as limited as when it released to little fanfare in 1978.