La gran aventura de Mortadelo y Filemón (Mortadelo and Filemón: The Big Adventure) is a 2003 Spanish film which served as the first live-action feature adaptation of the vastly popular Mortadelo y Filemón comic created by Francisco Ibáñez, also featuring characters from their sister works 13, Rue del Percebe and Rompetechos. The plot of the movie itself is vaguely inspired by that of El Sulfato Atómico, the first long-form story featuring the eponymous characters, though it also contains numerous references to various later albums. Just like the comics it is based on, the film is jam-packed with absurdist humor, cartoony slapstick, and Funny Background Events.
At the T.I.A. Headquarters, Professor Bacterio has just finished creating a new invention, the Desmoralizador de Tropas ("troop demoralizer"), or DDT, which emits waves that make whoever they hit hopelessly depressed and unwilling to do anything— as he and the Súper note, such a device has the potential to cripple armies. Unfortunately, it is then summarily stolen along with Bacterio's weather-changing device by Nadiusko, a spy who breaks into the agency and whose escape is unwittingly enabled by the arrival of the two eponymous knuckleheads. The Súper sends agent Fredy Mazas to retrieve the device, relegating Mortadelo and Filemón to a menial equipment relocation job during which they manage to launch a rocket that ends up in the Súper's butt, earning them a firing.
Meanwhile, Nadiusko plans to sell the DDT to Calimero, the whimsical, Psychopathic Manchild dictator of the Eastern European Republic of Tirania, having heard of his plans to invade England and demolish Buckingham Palace in order to develop a cheap housing project in its place. Fredy and Nadiusko are arrested at the Tiranian border, where the DDT ends up being thrown down a well, but Fredy escapes and impersonates Esfínter, the brother-in-law of Calimero's butler whom the dictator had intended to begin grooming as a heir. Nadiusko is executed by a firing squad while wearing Fredy's shirt, which is mailed back to the T.I.A., prompting them to get Mortadelo back on board for their backup plan: Claiming that Mortadelo is Calimero's long-lost son.
Back in Tirania, Fredy finds that the temptation of the power and wealth that would come with being Tirania's supreme ruler is too much for him and defects from the T.I.A. However, a wrench is thrown in his plan when Calimero sees the faxed picture of Mortadelo, which, thanks to Bacterio leaving his finger on the lens while taking it, makes it look like Mortadelo has six toes just like he does, which is all he needs to believe a child of his has been found. Fredy travels back to Spain and tries to kill Mortadelo, kidnapping Filemón's mother Menchu when that fails. With Fredy outed as a traitor, the Súper sends Mortadelo, Filemón and Ofelia to Tirania to rescue her and deal with Fredy.
The two titular characters are portrayed by Benito Pocino, who was hand-picked by director Javier Fesser without an audition after a makeup artist handed him a photograph (though his voice had to be dubbed over by Carlos Latre, as Pocino had trouble vocalizing), and Pepe Viyuela. Other stars include Mariano Venancio as the Súper, Berta Ojea as Ofelia, Dominique Pinon as Fredy, Paco Sagárzazu as Calimero and Emilio Gavira as Rompetechos.
This film provides examples of:
- Abnormal Ammo: One of Calimero's "state secrets" which he shows off to Fredy is an enormous cement ball, which he is having a team of engineers prepare to destroy Buckingham Palace by launching it across Europe using the crane it's being suspended on as a trebuchet. After a brief chat with the chief engineer, who says it'll be another three weeks before it's ready, Calimero decides to launch the ball immediately and it actually hits the palace— but because the cement was still wet, it simply falls apart on impact and makes a mess.
- Arc Words: The Súper calls Filemón a lastre ("burden") because of his incompetence, something that comes to bother him throughout the movie, culminating in a dramatic echo during Mortadelo's Disney Death scene.
- Assassin Outclassin': Fredy breaks into Filemón's mother's apartment, waiting in a closet to ambush her with a knife. She opens the closet in question after removing her wig, dentures and glass eye. Fredy faints.
- Corrupt Corporate Executive: Calimero shows that his only concern is getting rich off his people and his companies. When he receives a call about a defect in one of his projects, he simply asks if the tenants have already paid and immediately blows them off when he learns that they have.
- Disney Death: During the final confrontation, Filemón shows up and is quickly shot in the forehead by Fredy, but they quickly discover that it was actually an Expendable Clone made by Bacterio's people copier. Later, Mortadelo is mortally shot with a crossbow bolt by Calimero once the latter finds out he only has five toes and is thus not actually his son, but after the revelations that come in the next couple minutes, Calimero fills up his tennis tournament cup with some water for Mortadelo to drink, which miraculously heals his injury; the cup in question turns out to be the Holy Grail.
- Exact Words: Filemón uses Fredy's hypnotic device on the Súper, demanding first class tickets to travel to Tirania by airplane; the Súper promptly hands them over, saying they'll be in the VIP area. The next shot shows an airplane flying overhead, then quickly pans down to a crappy van called "The Airplane" clunking through the road, with the "VIP area" referring to a loud beeping noise coming from a horn inside the vehicle. It's revealed that the hypnotic device was out of batteries. Later, at the very end of the movie, the Súper congratulates Mortadelo and Filemón on their success and says that from that day forward, they will bear all of the organization's weight— which means they'll be carrying the people copier back to Spain on foot, across thousands of miles.
- Foreshadowing: Early in the movie, Filemón sends Mortadelo to unload the people copier machine from their truck while he sits in the cab. Mortadelo calls him a tyrant. There's also a few references to Filemón's absentee father. At the end, it's revealed that Filemón is actually Calimero's son.
- Fun with Acronyms: Par for the course for the franchise. Bacterio's DDT device is named after a chemical compound
that was commonly used as insecticide (but has been largely phased out due to being a pollutant). Mortadelo and Filemón are still in bed at 11 AM even though the Súper told them to be at work from 6 AM, which they took to mean "antes de merendar" ("before lunch"). - The Generalissimo: Calimero is described as an amalgamate of Antofagasto Panocho from the comics (himself a parody of various Latin American dictators, specifically Augusto Pinochet) and Rufus T. Firefly, while also being a parody of Francisco Franco as
confirmed by director Javier Fesser. He tells Fredy that he intends to declare World War IV during his next address; when Fredy tells him that World War III hasn't happened yet, he admits that he's just saying that to mess with people. The movie's version of the Queen of England also accuses him of having a complex because of his height and the size of his wiener, but he never really shows it in his own scenes. - Gratuitous English: Being a parody of the hyper-competent American secret agent stereotype, Fredy slips into some English phrases on occasion.
- Halfway Plot Switch: Initially, the plot is driven by the T.I.A.'s attempts to recover the DDT, but it is destroyed when the Tiranian border guard casually tosses it aside and it goes down a well (though no one actually realizes it is gone, and Nadiusko replaces it with the weather device and hopes Calimero won't notice). In the second half, the main conflict revolves around preventing Fredy from becoming Tirania's new dictator.
- Hates Being Nicknamed: Mortadelo and Filemón clash with a street tough named Elton Matraca, who Filemón ends up sharing a cell with in jail. When he inevitably starts beating up Filemón, the latter continually pleads with him to be reasonable while repeating what he thinks is his first name, but is actually short for "el tonto de a huevos" ("the drooling idiot") and a Berserk Button for the thug.
- Hoist by His Own Petard: Fredy hands Bacterio's weather device to one of the Tiranian subjects, instructing him to activate it as soon as Calimero declares him as successor, thinking it'll kill him. It ends up being activated when a hypnotized Fredy comes out onto the palace balcony, creating a lightning bolt that strikes an enormous helmet sculpture above which falls and crushes him.
- Hypno Ray: Fredy shows off to Ofelia with a pen-sized "American technology" device with a rotating black-and-white swirling spiral, which actually has the potential to Mind Control whoever looks at it. Mortadelo and Filemón end up pinching it off him and using it to humiliate and beat up Matraca. It ultimately ends up in Rompetechos' hands.
- Immediate Self-Contradiction: After the opening sequence, the Súper is interviewed by the press on rumors of the T.I.A. having been robbed:Súper: I deny it categorically! Nobody has stolen anything from anywhere! And what's more, the thief has been totally identified and we know exactly what he took from us, the bastard!
- Instantly Proven Wrong: Bacterio tells the Súper not to worry about Nadiusko breaking in, claiming that the safe he stashed the DDT in has an uncrackable combination. Cue the next shot that shows that the safe in question has stickers on the front showing the number 22, which Nadiusko immediately punches in, opening the safe.
- Kaiserreich / Putting on the Reich: Several Tiranian officers wear German-style Pickelhaube helmets. When Calimero addresses his subjects, his palace balcony is adorned with banners showing his crest, a cartoony black vulture on a red background wearing that same style of helmet and holding a road sign showing a laborer in its talons.
- Mythology Gag: Naming the DDT after a chemical pesticide is a reference to the titular substance from El Sulfato Atómico, which served as the basis for the film's basic plot structure.
- Percussive Maintenance: Bacterio gets his DDT to work this way after having a "Eureka!" Moment of hitting the radio to get it to tune back in.
- Planet of Hats: Thanks to Calimero's abuse of power, Tirania's economy is entirely based around his construction and architectural renovation companies. Calimero's ambitions involve designs on world-famous landmarks, such as covering the pyramids of Giza with colored tiles or razing the Amazon rainforest to build an enormous parking lot, which have made him vastly unpopular with other world leaders. When he addresses his subjects, they are assembled in different groups such as plasterers and bricklayers.
- Punch-Clock Villain: Pototo the Tiranian executioner does his job profesionally and without qualms but also insists on clocking out on time whenever possible and expresses annoyance when he can't.
- Red Herring: After being fired, Mortadelo and Filemón overhear a couple of street thugs say Mickey el Gigante, who is in jail, was involved in the heist of the DDT from the TIA. After getting thrown in jail on purpose to follow this up in an attempt to prove themselves, the agents learn that what Mickey actually stole were the "diamantes de la tía" (his aunt's diamonds).
- Refuge in Audacity: Every gag in the film can potentially count due to how absurd it is, but special mention must go to Ofelia's arrival in the Tiranian palace where she is introduced as the Queen of England, sings a jingle for Windex as she promises to clean up the palace, and quickly throws out "and Gibraltar is Spanish!" before stepping away from the balcony.
- Right Behind Me: When Filemón wakes up to find Mortadelo gone from their jail cell and hears that the T.I.A. bailed him out, he immediately shouts for the guard, saying that he is also a T.I.A. agent and to remember that he is the one who helped him put Matraca in jail. The very next moment, Matraca, who was put in the same cell, taps him on the shoulder and tells him not to worry, because he remembers.
- Ruder and Cruder: The film was notorious for being considerably more profane and cynical than its cartoony and mostly kid-friendly source material, also displaying elements of Grossout Show Spanish dramedy films that end up feeling out of place. Rompetechos is also depicted as an extremely irate Napoleon who looks back fondly on The Franco Regime, something that was never hinted at in the comics.
- Searching for the Lost Relative: Calimero reveals to Fredy that even though many people have come forward claiming to be his long-lost heir, he would be able to tell whether someone was really his child by seeing whether that person has six toes like himself. He ends up finding out that while Mortadelo doesn't actually have six toes, Filemón does, and is the son he unknowingly had with Menchu.
- Snipe Hunt: The Súper puts Mortadelo and Filemón in charge of moving Bacterio's people copier machine out of the agency after they mess up at the beginning. Filemón asks if there isn't a more exciting mission they can do; the Súper tells him to find the Holy Grail (which Filemón misidentifies as the Davis Cup) and bring it to him. At the end of the movie, Calimero's tennis trophy really turns out to be the Holy Grail— which Filemón once again calls the Davis Cup.
- The Starscream: Towards the end, Calimero announces that he has no intention of actually retiring and is merely planning to leave Fredy as a representative while he continues to enjoy his riches. Fredy promptly begins to plot on how to kill him.
- The Stinger: The ending reveals that Rompetechos ended up becoming Tirania's new ruler thanks to Fredy's hypnosis device. The next shot, however, shows that his only remaining loyal subject is Esfínter.
- You Are Fat: As usual, Ofelia is the target of several jokes in this fashion. Early on, Mortadelo and Filemón arm wrestle over who has to take her out to dinner; Filemón loses and cries, because as Mortadelo explains, that means he's the one who "has to take the cow out to pasture". Fredy, who flirts with her early in the movie, also openly calls her a cow and taunts her by mooing at the end, earning himself a punch in the face. Actress Berta Ojea expressed surprise at how many insults Ofelia received, and that she never completely rebelled as a result beyond beating up the bullies.
