ASTÉRIX & OBÉLIX: MISSION CLÉOPÂTRE (2002) ** The disproportionately absurd dubbed voices are vulgarly French (in spirit not intonation), and lead to the funniest line of the film. I don't understand why they have to dub someone else for Gerard Depardieu. He speaks better English than most of us, and it would seem acceptable, in a French film, to have a French character with a slightly French accent. I dunno, maybe I missed something. Maybe I'm glad if I did. It's not the worst of Depardieu's problems, anyway. He's no better or worse than anyone else, which is entirely unacceptable. I mean, here's this guy who's successfully, often brilliantly, portrayed characters with extreme and pathological aspects of every imaginable variation, and he gets a chance to do an honest cartoon, and he gives us an understated Obelix? Quelle bizarre! Why isn't Obelix eating 500 boars, and drinking all the wine in Egypt, and juggling pyramids? Singing all the way. There are a lot of asides and tributaries that are kind of fun, but no reason to believe that Asterix will ever have cinematic success to match the aesthetic magnitude of his series of literary triumphs.