The Trip to Greece, available on demand, is the fourth in the series starring Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon as pretty much themselves having entertaining conversations over sumptuous meals in picturesque countries. It seemed the perfect escape during a pandemic that has put travel on hold. Yet that very circumstance made me see the shortcomings of the movies, at least as travelogues. The banter and the impersonations were as amusing as always, but this time I missed any indication, other than the visual, of the country they were traveling through. After an early scene in which they give a lift to a man who works in a refugee camp, and get a rare jolt of reality, there were no interactions with locals who weren't waiters or waitresses, and the only time one of these extended beyond the perfunctory, the server was a blonde with a German accent. We didn’t hear once, in the entire movie, a note of Greek music. And one of the pleasures of Greece is – or at least was – hearing nothing but Greek music. It’s a country that comes with its own soundtrack. Perhaps they wanted to avoid the cliché of Zorba, though I could easily picture Coogan dancing to shouts of Opa!
The Greece we were introduced to was the ancient one, as they dutifully visit ruins, and Coogan frequently references the great philosophers. It was like a generic travel article – focusing on the history, ignoring the people, downplaying the present, giving a romanticized, unblemished picture of the place. If only travel articles could be so funny.
