Absolutely Anything

The weight of expectation can be a absolute killer. When you see a film directed by Terry Jones (Monty Python and the Holy Grail) featuring the voices of the entire surviving Monty Python troupe as galactic overlords, your brain starts doing celebratory somersaults. Throw in Simon Pegg (Shaun of the Dead) as the lead and the final performance of Robin Williams as a talking dog, and you aren’t just looking at a movie—you’re looking at a comedy "Avengers" moment.

I watched Absolutely Anything on my laptop on a rainy Tuesday while trying to ignore my neighbor’s relentless power-drilling, and I found myself desperately wanting to love it. It’s a film with the DNA of giants, yet it feels strangely small. It’s a high-concept sci-fi comedy that arrived in 2015 but feels like it was unearthed from a time capsule buried in 1997.

A Galactic Test of Mediocrity

The setup is pure, classic sci-fi premise-building: A group of CGI aliens—who look like a cross between colorful space-slugs and something you’d find at the bottom of a cereal box—decide to test humanity’s worth. They pick one random human, Neil (Simon Pegg), and grant him the power to do "absolutely anything" with a wave of his hand. If he uses the power for good, Earth lives. If he’s a selfish jerk, we get vaporized.

It’s basically Bruce Almighty with a British accent and significantly more jokes about canine anatomy. Simon Pegg is, as always, the most likable guy in the room. He plays Neil with a frantic, wide-eyed sincerity that keeps the movie afloat even when the script starts to leak. The problem is that the film’s "What If?" scenarios feel oddly dated. In an era where contemporary sci-fi usually leans into the dark or the hyper-complex, Absolutely Anything plays it like a mid-tier sitcom. Neil wishes for a "great body" and gets a torso like a Greek god but keep his own head. He wishes for his friend Ray (Sanjeev Bhaskar) to be adored by the woman he loves, which leads to a bizarre subplot involving a literal religious cult.

The movie looks like a rejected pilot for a BBC Three show with a slightly inflated VFX budget. It lacks the visual wit of Terry Gilliam or the sharp, satirical bite of Edgar Wright. Instead, it’s a series of "be careful what you wish for" gags that don't always land.

The Voice of a Legend

The real reason most people will seek this out now—and why it deserves a spot in your "curiosity" queue—is Robin Williams. Providing the voice for Dennis, Neil’s loyal and perpetually horny biscuit-obsessed dog, Williams is the undisputed highlight. It’s bittersweet to hear that manic, improvisational energy one last time. When Dennis gains the power of speech and immediately starts demanding treats or discussing his urge to hump legs, you can hear the twinkle in Williams' voice.

The scenes between Simon Pegg and the dog are the only times the film truly finds its heart. While Kate Beckinsale (Underworld) is charming as the love interest, Catherine, she is given frustratingly little to do besides being the "prize" for Neil to win or lose. Meanwhile, Rob Riggle (21 Jump Street) shows up as a stalking American colonel, leaning into his trademark "loud guy" persona that feels like it belongs in a completely different movie.

The Monty Python reunion—John Cleese, Michael Palin, Terry Gilliam, and Eric Idle voicing the aliens—is a lovely gesture, but it’s mostly just that. Their characters are CGI blobs that don't allow for much physical comedy, and you can’t help but wish they were on screen together in the flesh, trading barbs in a corridor rather than being muffled by digital layers.

Why This Vanished Into the Void

Why did a movie with this much pedigree disappear? For starters, it was a "dump" release in many territories. Released in 2015—the same year as Mad Max: Fury Road and the return of Star Wars—this little Brit-com felt like a relic. It was a passion project Terry Jones had been developing since the 90s, and honestly, you can tell. Its sensibilities are pre-streaming, pre-social media, and pre-edgy-humor.

Turns out, the script was actually written twenty years before it was filmed, and it shows. The comedy lacks the cynical, fast-paced rhythm of modern 2010s humor. In an era where we were all becoming exhausted by franchise saturation, a standalone sci-fi comedy should have felt refreshing. Instead, it felt like a warm glass of ginger ale that’s been sitting on the counter since the Blair administration.

That obscurity is also due to a lack of clear identity. Is it a family film? There’s too much sex-and-dog-butt humor. Is it a hard-hitting satire? Not really. It’s a gentle, slightly messy romp that exists because a group of old friends wanted to work together one last time. Apparently, the Python crew recorded their lines separately, which explains why the chemistry feels a bit disjointed.

Absolutely Anything is a fascinating footnote in comedy history. It’s not the grand swan song that Terry Jones or Robin Williams deserved, but it’s far from a disaster. It’s a light, occasionally chucklesome "What If?" story that benefits immensely from Simon Pegg’s endless charisma. If you’re a Python completist or just want to hear Robin Williams voice a dog obsessed with sausages, it’s a perfectly pleasant way to kill 85 minutes—just don't expect it to change your world. It’s a film that asks if humanity is worth saving and concludes that, while we’re mostly idiots, we’re at least occasionally funny.