The Fundy Film Society

The Trip

The Trip

The Trip is an acerbically witty road adventure through the English countryside. Reprising their hilariously fictionalized roles from 2005’s Tristram Shandy: A Cock and Bull Story, Steve Coogan (In The Loop, Our Idiot Brother) and Rob Brydon (24 Hour Party People) reunite with director Michael Winterbottom (A Mighty Heart, Tristram Shandy) for a hilarious road movie which follows the two comedians as they eat, riff, jab and dissect adulthood, fatherhood, relationships, their careers and Michael Caine.

Coogan is asked by The Observer newspaper to travel through the Lake District and Yorkshire Dales, dining in fine restaurants and visiting various historic locations from the life of William Wordsworth. But when his girlfriend backs out on him, he has no one to accompany him on the trip. Enter Brydon, his best friend and source of eternal aggravation. After a half-hearted invitation where Coogan explains he’s asked everyone else and that Brydon is his last resort, the two of them set off in the car, armed only with a map and incredible comic timing.

Coogan and Brydon make a brilliant comic duo, freestyling with flair and performing impressions (Sean Connery, Woody Allen, and Michael Sheen to name a few) that are hilarious whether they’re spot on or just in the ballpark. But the film is more than just jokes. With the same effortless slips between fiction and fact of Tristram Shandy, Winterbottom grounds his comedy in timeless observations about the importance of friendship and family. Brydon, the family man, makes constant calls home to his wife and new baby, while Coogan pines for his girlfriend amidst casual one-night stands. By the end of the journey, both men realize that loved ones are more important than any amount of fame.