David Brent: Life on the Road (2016)

Happily, what’s in no short supply is the same mix of uproarious failure and sledgehammer pathos that Brent at his best was always all about.

While Gervais returns often to the same comedic well, he’s adept at transforming simple miscues into horrific spirals of embarrassment.

A late third-act turn into sentimental territory, in which the original show’s misanthropy is sugared up, may feel artificial to viewers drawn to the series’ persistent despairing streak; still, it makes a certain sense given that the film would otherwise entirely lack an emotional arc.

Life on the Road ultimately makes good in a way that few comedy films based on television characters do. Perhaps part of that owes to Gervais’ not-so-subtle, yet still powerful, insights into David Brent.

Being stuck in a cinema with David Brent for 96 minutes can be trying (the lazy ending doesn’t help). But when Gervais is on an improvisational roll, Brent digging himself deeper and deeper into some awful pit of social awkwardness, we can’t help but remember why we love to hate them both.