Film Review - Get Smart
Nov. 22nd, 2008 11:08 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shadowkatStill wide awake, because I waited too long to eat - ate after 8:30, which is bad. As any good gastrointestonologist will tell you, one should never eat after 8pm, actually they say 6pm, but let's be realistic.
Just watched the flick Get Smart - which surprised me by how incredibly funny it was. I was expecting it to be mildly humorous in places but not laugh out loud and until you're coughing and wheezing...funny. I'd liked the original television series in which it was based. Yes, I'm old enough to remember the 1970s and young enough to remember them fondly.
Only small children enjoyed that decade, we were too young to notice the bad fashion, inflation, high gas prices, and cheesy hair styles. Get Smart was on either in reruns or in the evenings, not sure which, when I was a small child. It was our baby-sitter's favorite series - so we watched it, along with Happy Days. (Really hope no one tries to make a film version of Happy Days. That would just be sad.) The film is oddly close to the original - same deadpan humor, ironic wit, and sly pratfalls - this is subtle physical comedy, before John Ritter found a way to exaggerate it in Three's Company. Although will give Ritter credit - he's the only guy I know who can make a fall down the steps hilarious.
Steve Carroll - is charming. And sort of grows on you. Before you know it, you find yourself enamored. It's a gift. Not everyone can do that. I also found Ann Hathway likeable in the film and rather close match to the original actress who played the part. Well worth a rental, particularly if you need a good laugh.
As for plot - it's an origin tale. Maxwell Smart is an analyst with Control - a covert intelligence agency. He dreams of becoming an agent. Has worked hard to become one. A traitor is in the midst of Control and blows the place up, including everyone's covers. As a result, Maxwell Smart is upgraded to agent status and is assigned to the reluctant Agent 99, who would rather not work with Smart (because of his lack of field experience). They embark on a mission - which subtly pokes fun at spy movies. It's not broad parody like Austin Powers, Get Smart is more satirical, and dryer. Maxwell Smart is actually quite intelligent, but lacks a certain level of common sense and is a bit of a clutz. He is however somewhat self-aware of this fact and doesn't let it get to him. Example - they are swinging from one building to the next, intending on going through the window, instead they hit the wall. Smart to 99: "Missed it by thismuch."
Just watched the flick Get Smart - which surprised me by how incredibly funny it was. I was expecting it to be mildly humorous in places but not laugh out loud and until you're coughing and wheezing...funny. I'd liked the original television series in which it was based. Yes, I'm old enough to remember the 1970s and young enough to remember them fondly.
Only small children enjoyed that decade, we were too young to notice the bad fashion, inflation, high gas prices, and cheesy hair styles. Get Smart was on either in reruns or in the evenings, not sure which, when I was a small child. It was our baby-sitter's favorite series - so we watched it, along with Happy Days. (Really hope no one tries to make a film version of Happy Days. That would just be sad.) The film is oddly close to the original - same deadpan humor, ironic wit, and sly pratfalls - this is subtle physical comedy, before John Ritter found a way to exaggerate it in Three's Company. Although will give Ritter credit - he's the only guy I know who can make a fall down the steps hilarious.
Steve Carroll - is charming. And sort of grows on you. Before you know it, you find yourself enamored. It's a gift. Not everyone can do that. I also found Ann Hathway likeable in the film and rather close match to the original actress who played the part. Well worth a rental, particularly if you need a good laugh.
As for plot - it's an origin tale. Maxwell Smart is an analyst with Control - a covert intelligence agency. He dreams of becoming an agent. Has worked hard to become one. A traitor is in the midst of Control and blows the place up, including everyone's covers. As a result, Maxwell Smart is upgraded to agent status and is assigned to the reluctant Agent 99, who would rather not work with Smart (because of his lack of field experience). They embark on a mission - which subtly pokes fun at spy movies. It's not broad parody like Austin Powers, Get Smart is more satirical, and dryer. Maxwell Smart is actually quite intelligent, but lacks a certain level of common sense and is a bit of a clutz. He is however somewhat self-aware of this fact and doesn't let it get to him. Example - they are swinging from one building to the next, intending on going through the window, instead they hit the wall. Smart to 99: "Missed it by thismuch."
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Date: 2008-11-27 05:55 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-11-27 06:19 pm (UTC)I agree. Unlike most of the tv to film adaptations, this one was an actual homage to the original, building on it, as opposed to a parody. Of course, Get Smart was in a way a parody/satire of spy films itself so making a parody/satire of it - would have been overkill. It's not like Starsky and Hutch or the Brady Bunch - which weren't parodies and tv shows, but you desperately want to make fun of for their 70's kitsch factor. Get Smart - was already poking fun at itself and its genre - that was its charm. The spy in Get Smart was not the towering action hunk a la Scean Connery, but the wiry small nerdy guy - who solved things with his brain and a wry sense of humor. A bit like Chuck does, except think Morgan in the role.
I admit, I was a bit worried they'd try to do a parody of it, rather surprised and relieved they chose the homage route.