The League of Gentlemen's Apocalypse

With the League of Gentlemen's nightmarish creation making the leap from the small to the big screen it's no longer a local film for local people.

And that's the problem. The effective small scale of cramming all the action into Royston Vasey is lost when they leave their claustrophobic world behind.

Nipping through a gap in the space-time continuum, butcher Hilary Briss, German exchange master Herr Lipp and businessmen Geoff Tipps make it out into 21st century.

There they discover that everyone and everything in their beloved Royston Vasey has been invented by comedy troupe The League of Gentlemen.

Now the writers have decided to move on to a 17th century diabolical drama…leaving RV and its defenceless inhabitants to a prolonged death.

Unfortunately, the decision to place the TLOG's gallery of grotesques beyond all their comedy reference points means they can't function.

Herr Lipp's camp innuendo still occasionally amuses ("I usually back up onto a five inch floppy") but Briss and Tipps falter without their comedy foils back in Royston Vasey.

The device of having the characters confront their creators is also over-contrived and those unfamiliar with the TV series will seriously struggle to tell who is who.

The acting - always a strongpoint of Mark Gatiss, Steve Pemberton and Reece Shearsmith - is pretty flawles...but they've not given themselves a lot to work with.

It doesn't help that director Steve Bendeleck wears his TV comedy background (Lenny Henry, French & Saunders) heavily and looks ill at ease with a broader canvas.

For comedy masters as accomplished as The League, it's pretty second division stuff.

Tim Evans