Cringe-worthy comedy more suited to the 1970s

Even if you really love Emma Thompson or Pierce Brosnan, and who doesn't, you will be hard pressed to squeeze much fun from The Love Punch, a witless, idiotic comedy that makes you cringe.

If real on-screen charm was enough to make an entertaining crime caper then there's no doubt that Pierce Brosnan and Emma Thompson have it in spades.

Attractive French locations add a pleasant background for an undernourished script that finds Brosnan and his ex-wife Thompson joining forces to steal a precious diamond from the businessman crook who has left them flat broke.

Brosnan and Thompson, and Timothy Spall and Celia Imrie as their happy go-lucky-accomplices all give writer-director John Hopkins much more than he deserves but in the end they, and the audience, are let down.

The Love Punch is a kind of grey-pound comedy, which is a little insulting for stars Pierce Brosnan and Emma Thompson, neither of whom are old enough to sign up for a TV funeral payment scam and free Parker pen. If only we could say the same about the prehistoric one-liners.

Joel Hopkins guides us around The Lover Punch's setting

Discover the beautiful filming locations of Emma Thompson and Pierce Brosnan's new rom-com.

The Love Punch is a British farce starring Pierce Brosnan, Emma Thompson, Celia Imrie and Timothy Spall, four cheerful Garden of England pensioners (Emma? You're only 55!) stealing a diamond necklace in the south of France in order to haul themselves out of impending penury. With its extreme mugging, it will feel either insultingly ridiculous or a simple amusement depending on how drunk you are.

Cinema can be perfunctory on the theme of love at the best of times, but Brosnan and Thompson play out their romance as though it were a game of charades. If they were wearing feather boas they would be winking over them until their eyelids dislocated, having the time of their lives in a champagne-and-trifle dreamworld while we loll, longing for literally anything else. A movie about Stalin? The Foreign Legion? Donald Duck?

For all its obvious charms, the first run of Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon's improvised sitcom did sometimes seem like little more than a Parmesan-crisp thin excuse for its stars to gorge on high-end scran. Credit all the Mediterranean cuisine being scarfed down or just tighter direction from Michael Winterbottom, but this sequel outing to Italy feels more substantial. Tonight's episode features a plot, with the pair venturing to Shelley's house by boat, and Brydon chirpsing one of the crew. Impressions galore - Tom Jones, Pierce Brosnan - too.

Michael McIntyre and his 'lookalikes'

Michael McIntyre reckons he passes for Bond star Pierce Brosnan "with a mouth full of sweets" - but Pierce isn't his only famous lookalike... apparently.

If Paul, the last Simon Pegg/Nick Frost movie, was a self-indulgent journey into the outer realms of nerdiness, their latest collaboration is aimed squarely at those without an intimate knowledge of the Star Wars movies.

A crowd pleaser, this is a sci-fi comedy for everyone. Twenty years after a teenage pub crawl through their hometown, Pegg rounds up his old buddies (Frost, Paddy Considine, Martin Freeman, Eddie Marsan) for a re-run.

But while reminiscing, they learn that the place has a severe case of the Stepfords.

The film contains plenty that men approaching middle age will relate to and the laughs never dry up with Pierce Brosnan, who plays one of their former teachers, an absolute hoot.