Those
who remember the television series I Spy starring
Bill Cosby and Robert Culp from 1965-1968 will hardly recognize
the 2002 spoof with the same title, starring Eddie Murphy
and Owen Wilson and directed by Betty Thomas. The film is
also a spoof on this year's Bad
Company, starring Anthony Hopkins and Chris
Rock, a plot that I Spy appears to mimic. Instead of Prague,
I Spy chooses Budapest. Instead
of a solar-powered submarine, the weapon to be saved from
the evildoers is a Stealth II prototype that has been stolen
by Gunder (played by Malcolm McDowell). Gunder, in turn, is
selling the airplane, which cannot be detected by radar or
even the naked eye, to the highest bidder. Middleweight champion
Kelly Robinson (played by Eddie Murphy) receives a telephone
call from President George W. Bush, urging him to cooperate
with a secret national security operation to retrieve the
airplane. He is to work alongside Alexander Scott (played
by Owen Wilson), a spy who appears to be somewhat less than
competent. Since Gunder has invited Robinson to fight the
European middleweight champion Cedric Mills (played by Darren
Shahlavi) in Budapest, Scott will penetrate Gunder's fortress
as an assistant of Robinson. The bungling duo is caught in
the act, chased all over Budapest, and escapes capture, though
there appears to be no vital information that they could have
obtained while inside Gunder's castle. Instead, CIA surveillance
technology leads the duo to the location of the airplane,
which is in the process of being sold to a person who looks
either Chinese or Japanese. Shootouts and doublecrosses occur,
and the airplane ultimately ends up in the Danube. Rachel
(played by Famke Janssen), one of Scott's coworkers, plays
double agent, steals Swiss bank account passcodes, but the
spying duo locates her in Monte Carlo, where she is arrested.
The dialog is rapid and vapid, amusing for teenagers but boring
for adults. But at least we have seen a magnificent video
postcard of Budapest. MH
I
want to comment on this film
