I was hesitant taking another trip w/ Steve and Rob in that I so much loved the first film and thought this film might be a letdown and was never going to expectations set by the first film. No need for worries, this film was just as good, just as funny and better still, both Steve and Rob have remained (aside from Coogan's haircut) them old selves, changing little from when we left them in Northern England, a perfect mixture of affability and arrogance, quick witted, sometimes to the point of absurdity, sprinkled with a tinge of melancholy.

If you love British humour, travel & beautiful scenery, fine food, movies, literature and poetry, and beautiful women......(pretty much all things worth living for)... than this is the movie to watch.

Steve: (looking at a beautiful hotel receptionist walking past) She's has a lovely gait.

Rob: Yes, probably padlocked.

Hilarious!

Rob Brydon invites Steve Coogan on another food tour commissioned by The Observer. Steve is on hiatus from his American show and decides to go along with the Italian trip. Steve is off alcohol. They discuss the lives and work of Shelley and Byron. The married Rob has a fling with British ex-pat Lucy (Rosie Fellner). They eat a lot of pasta and sing along to Alanis Morissette. They do a lot of impressions both good and bad, all comical. Rob has an audition for a minor role in an American movie. They are joined by Steve's assistant Emma (Claire Keelan) and later on, his son.

I liked the first movie 'The Trip'. I'm not familiar with Brydon and I only know Coogan from his movies. In the first movie, there are obvious moments of a written story but it's the charm of an easy friendship that is truly compelling. It's not real but I get a sense that it could be a version of reality. This one starts in a similar space with impressions of Michael Caine. Coogan is a little sour but ragging on Tom Hardy as Bane seems to help. The movie goes a bit wonky when Rob starts flirting with Lucy. The moment he cheats on his wife and little girl is when the movie struggled for me. The easy charm of the original becomes a highly fictionalize drama. The problem is that there isn't enough drama for it to be compelling. There is a difference between two friends hanging out and two fictional characters hanging out. I prefer the fictional characters to do something.

THE TRIP TO ITALY (2014) *** Filmmaker Michael Winterbottom reteams with comedy duo Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon in this sequel to the popular road trip flick this time in gloriously picturesque Italy frequenting the nation's cafes, restaurants and amazing food-porn while bickering, bantering and imitating the likes of Michael Caine and Hugh Grant unerringly with brio. While it feels like more of the same, the DynamicDuo manage to make the most of the week-long travelogue and navel gazing with brash wit in spite of some tacked on plot devices (a fictional son for the uppity Coogan and an unlikely assignation for the amiable Brydon). Funny and frequently touching ball-busting between blokes on a lark for seconds.