LEGENDARY funny man Ricky Gervais may have gone on to international stardom. But his alter ego David Brent is back where he started - in Slough.

In real life Ricky spent years working in an office after a failed attempt at a pop career. Then he hit gold on television playing office boss David Brent - that instantly recognisable humourless and pompous office manager in the mock documentary The Office.

Since The Office ended Ricky has starred in Hollywood films he made himself, hosted award ceremonies and created a gallery of TV and movie characters.

Now he has brought Brent back - on the big screen in the new movie David Brent: Life on the Road.

He never intended to. But an invitation to do a one off sketch for Comic Relief set the ball rolling.

He said: "It was 10 years after we'd seen Brent and I thought it might be nice to take a glimpse just for five minutes into his life. That sketch was all about him working as a salesman still in Slough. But he'd taken a young rapper under his wing because he thought he was the local Simon Cowell."

As part of the sketch he made a pop video of Brent performing a song called Equality Street. He ended doing live gigs with a backing band called Foregone Conclusions, singing hilariously inept songs supposedly written by Brent.

They sold out.

Slough Observer:

Audiences loved it, although of course in the new movie it is a disaster.

The film works well.

Brent is no longer anyone's boss but a struggling salesman - inevitably of a product guaranteed to raise easy laughs.

He cashes in all his pension schemes - an up to date touch this as Brent has just reached the magic age of 55. Then he blows it on an ill-judged 'tour' singing his awful songs backed by an embarrassed team of professional musicians he has paid who need the work.

The famous 'Slough' song featuring immortal couplets like 'more convenient than a Tesco Express - close to Windsor but the property's less'.

Taplow and Bray both get name checks.

In the end the film has a good humoured edge to its black and often cringe making humour.

We are allowed to like Brent a little bit - and writer director Ricky allows him his small victory and the grudging affection of his long suffering band.

Ricky said: "If people think they're going to see Glee or something particularly glamorous, they're not. It goes from emotion to pathos to caper to tragedy. It's a real movie not an episode of the Office or a tie-in special."

His band in the film features Andy Burrows from Razorlight and the two have put together an album of all of the songs in the film - all 'bad' of course but riotously funny and often rather endearing.

Meanwhile Ricky's or rather David Brent's image dominates the entrance to the Queensmere Observatory shopping centre, ready for the film's opening there today.

David Brent is home again - in Slough.