For me Mindhorn is more cringe worthy than comedic.Its cast in the same vein as "The Office" where someone's blatant and rather clumsy attempts to impress, backfire. Personally, what I would call "humiliation comedy" is more cringe worthy than genuinely amusing. Like sarcasm, it attaches cheap gags and tags to someone's foolish behaviour and runs with it. I found little that was clever or genuinely witty about this tale of a washed up action television star. Indeed, viewed from a different perspective its rather sad and a little depressing. On the upside the acting is fine and it has the usual British sense of level headed-ness that prevents the whole thing from descending into farce.Whilst its not for me if you liked The Office you may enjoy Mindhorn. Six out of ten from me.

Washed up actor Richard Thorncroft once had it all with his hit eighties show 'Mindhorn' where he played a bionic cop – a bit like the Six Million Dollar Man but more for a price quoted in Pounds, shillings and pence. Then a brutal murder happens on The Isle of Man and the number one suspect will only deal with the legendary detective… despite the fact he is fictional.Eager to relaunch his career and get back to the days of being recognised by the 'great unwashed' he accepts the gig and goes back in to character. Little does he know that when he walks back on to that island he walks back into the past and a whole 'cluster farque' of problems.Needless to say I loved this. The slapstick, overacting and badly fitting wigs are a joy to behold. The marvellous Julian Barratt plays Mindhorn perfectly and all the cast are great with Kenneth Brannagh giving a career best (IMHO) when he appears in a dream sequence. Russell Tovey seemed to be having a ball too and as for Mr Simon Callow he is always oodles of fun. All in all a great film and I wish there were more like it.

"Mindthorn" is one of the newest Netflix productions to be released. However, it is very unusual in that it has a mostly British cast and it was filmed on the Isle of Man…an unusual location for a Netflix film, I know. In fact, most people outside the United Kingdom probably have no idea where the Isle of Man is or if it exists at all! I assure you, it does and the self-governing island is hope to tailless cats and motorcycle racing! When the story begins, you learn that back in the late 1980s there was a British television series called "Mindthorn". It was about some bizarre private detective with a cybernetic eye who went on adventures and solved crimes. The problem is that today, a crazed maniac believes that the show was completely real and is demanding the police let him speak to Mindthorn. As for the actor who played the title character, Richard Thorncroft (Julian Barrett) is a complete mess and can only find work doing commercials for compression socks and adult bladder protection these days! He hopes that by traveling to the island that he'll become a hero and revive his stalled career. But there is one serious problem….Thorncroft is a complete jerk…and a dumb one at that. He manages to alienate just about everyone he meets and you cannot help but hate him….but there is far, far more to the story.Up to the point I've described, the film is a bit hard to take because Thorncroft is such a big jerk….a thorough and complete jerk. Fortunately, the second half of the film improves tremendously and becomes rather funny…especially when he ends up teaming up with a guy who calls himself 'the Kestrel'. The film takes a definite turn towards the weird as well as the heroic and actually is very unique and worth seeing.This film is clearly one that I urge you to keep watching…even with a slow start. My wife cringed repeatedly and found Thorncroft's character so annoying and awful she wanted to stop watching. As for me, I have a higher threshold for the embarrassing and weird and really enjoyed the film. It's uneven, of course, but a film that ends on a very high note. Hopefully, we'll see more stuff like this from Netflix.

Richard Thorncroft is a has-been British TV actor who used to be famous in the late 1980's for playing the titular and charismatic lead role in the Isle of Man detective show Mindhorn, a character with a Robotic eye that could literally see the truth. Richard has an unexpected opportunity to reignite his career though when a delusional criminal calling himself The Kestrel starts terrorising the Isle of Man and, having an extremely unhealthy obsession with the show, demands to talk only to Mindhorn. Relishing a chance for publicity, Richard dons his robotic eye, aggravates the police with his method acting, and tries to rekindle an old romance.........I think to appreciate the film just that little bit more, you really have to be of a certain age when these awfully cheesy police shows were rife on the T.V. back in the eighties. Granted, the U.K. never had anything as over the top as Mindhorn, but shows like Dempsey and Makepeace, C.A.T.S eyes, and Lovejoy were very tongue in cheek.You could really imagine Mindhorn being a staple of Saturday night T.V right after the football results were read out at five in the afternoon, while all the family were sitting having their tea.But I wonder just how many celebrities who made it big very quickly and then tried to make it big in Hollywood and failing miserably does Barratt reference? The obvious ones are Coronation Street's own Chris Quentin who famously played 'reporter 2' in Robocop 2, or Ali Osman from Eastenders who went there, came back, and co-starred in Carry On Columbus.And then there's Robert Lindsay, but he came back and made My family.It's a truly wonderful concept, and there are times when the film is laugh out loud funny, especially when Simon Callow makes an appearance. But Thorncroft doesn't really feel like an original character, as at times he reminded me of David Brent, and even Alan Partridge.But the film never outstays it's welcome, and Barratt is self deprecating enough to make Thorncroft funnier than he should be.But if you find the first ten minutes utterly hilarious, especially the Mindhorn opening credits, you'll find lots to love about this.