Genre ComedyRating PG-131 out of 5 stars
If you’re looking for the ultimate buddy movie this weekend, you’re better off seeing “Jackass.” Of course, if you’re looking for fewer ball-breaking stunts, you’d better go with “I Spy.”
In the remake of the 1960s television show, Owen Wilson and Eddie Murphy team up in order to thwart the always-pleasing Malcolm McDowell.
Alex Scott (Wilson) is an under-appreciated goofball of a secret agent who turns even more pathetic when near fellow secret agent Rachel (Famke Janssen).
Alex receives an assignment to find and retrieve a newly designed “smart” reconnaissance jet that is on the market in Budapest. The man selling it, Gundars (McDowell), just happens to be sponsoring a boxing match for Kelly Robinson (Murphy), an overbearing, pompous and arrogant man who wears on the viewers’ nerves.
On Robinson and Scott’s first meeting, semi-malicious banter flies between them, and before you know it, it’s more annoying than humorous.
The movie is by the numbers, with an appropriate amount of explosions, laughs, and cleavage.
Although it has a running time of only 96 minutes, it seems to drag on for much longer, making you wish you had your own gun to alleviate your suffering.
“I Spy” commits a capital sin of making old TV shows into movies. The humor falls flat.
When “I Spy” came on television, it tapped into the humor of the viewing audience, giving everyone who watched it something funny to relate to. Unfortunately, the movie’s humor is lost on a much more jaded, older audience.
What also is missing from this movie is the appeal that it had when it first debuted on television.
Bill Cosby’s role on “I Spy” not only launched the standup comic’s career, but it showcased the first black man as a hero in prime time television. People had a reason to watch.
Too bad the movie doesn’t give anyone a reason to watch.
What’s worse, “I Spy” tries to be humorous while at the same time trying to have the dashing, dangerous James Bond-type appeal that keeps more and more audiences flocking to the theatre year after year.
Face it people, the two just don’t mix.
Fans of Owen Wilson and Eddie Murphy will be disappointed to see that there is very little screen chemistry between the two.
Instead of playing off one another and adding to each other’s performances, the two rely on themselves more, each trying to carry the movie on his own. The relationship between the two just never gels.
The movie’s director, Betty Thomas, does everything by the book.
Nowhere is there any sort of originality or a modicum of thought put into the movie.
Unlike her previous hit “The Brady Bunch Movie”, “I Spy” lacks the humor that her movies usually have.
In most movies, a good screenplay, good actors, or even good directing can save a movie that’s otherwise trash. Sadly, this movie doesn’t have any of the three.
Go see “Jackass” instead… at least it’s surprising.
Kelly Robinson (Eddie Murphy) and Alex Scott (Owen Wilson) share on-screen time as a pathetic duo of special agents in this contrived comedy. (Columbia Pictures)
