A couple of points... and I agree.

 

I still watch TRAIL whenever I get to the end of watching all of Peter's movies, which I do in a cycle, at least once a year.  Because there is still a good 35-40 minutes of a New Pink Panther movie before Clouseau disappears. Even second rate Pink Panther.  And Herbert Lom's work in the film does a wonderful job of tying everything together.  My biggest regret about this project is that the footage of Julie Andrews as a hotel maid from RETURN OF THE PINK PANTHER is not included.  Reportedly, the footage was lost, though I remember seeing it in the 1970s.  Maybe on the Tonight Show?  Also, Julie is supposed to be somewhere in TRAIL but I don't see her.

 

Here is my theory on why all the previous Non - Sellers Clouseau films have failed.

 

Clouseau is not a character from literature or another medium.  He doesn't already exist in another form.  He is a character created out of whole cloth by Peter Sellers and Blake Edwards in 1963.  And the two men subsequently honed and expanded the character over the next 15 years.  Sellers provided the man.  Edwards provided the context the man would exist in.

 

Without the second, the first cannot exist.  And without the man, the context makes no sense.  This is why CURSE OF THE PINK PANTHER and SON OF THE PINK PANTHER were such failures.  They had the context but not the man.  Conversely, I can only assume that the Edwards-less Clive Donner ROMANCE OF THE PINK PANTHER (1980) would have beeb an equal failure, providing the man without his proper context or environment.  It's a good script... I enjoyed it... but I don't think it would have been a runaway hit.

 

And this is also why the Martin films failed.  Peter and Blake created the character of Clouseau.  He is their perfect creation.  To play it as Peter did is nothing more than imitation.  To play it differently, as Martin bravely tried to do, only creates a less adequate version of Edwards & Seller's perfection.  And the directors Martin used... game as they were... could only hope to loosely imitate Edwards' context.


-----Original Message-----
From: imeminexx@...
To: petersellersappreciationsociety@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Tue, 31 Mar 2009 9:24 am
Subject: [PeterSellersAppreciationSociety] (unknown)

We haven't discussed Trail of the Pink Panther.I find enormous faults and think it an insult and not a tribute to PS so much as a tribute to BE.If that isn't too obvious then the promotion of Black Edwards "coming soon " film in the ending credits make the purpose of the movie clear.I get more enraged by it than L & D as it USES his image and name to feed off for money ,and money only to BE. BE cannot admit that any PP movie w/o Sellers bombed because it was w/o Sellers.I read a review once that said it right.The PP movie with PS made more than any movie second only to the James Bond series.That Clouseau was the most loved and related to character to date.That proves the point that the public can see anyone play James Bond and still come for more,but that only one man can BE Clouseau or they won't come at all.