I never would have believed it if I hadn´t seen it with my own eyes. The big budget, big screen adaptation of TV´s "Get Smart" isn´t nearly the disaster some critics have made it out to be. Yes, it´s not high concept or terribly brilliant. The eventual "twist" is painfully obvious halfway through the film. Some characters are abandoned for prolonged periods of time. And the humor can border on the juvenile (though never vulgar).
When Maxwell Smart (Steve Carell of TV´s "The Office") is paired with Agent 99 (Anne Hathaway, "The Devil Wears Prada") following an attack on the super-secret headquarters of not-so-secret United States intelligence organization CONTROL, they find themselves in Russia, hot on the heels of stolen nuclear material. But Smart is only an analyst and a bubbling one at that while 99 has years of experience under her belt. Can she rein him in enough to keep them both alive, find the bad guys and play straight man to Smart´s innocent jokes?
From its opening moments, it´s quite obvious "Get Smart" is intent on doing on thing: making us laugh. Everything else is secondary. As the credits roll over Smart preparing for his day, we see post it notes reminding him to carry out certain tasks. The best one? A reminder, on an empty goldfish bowl, to buy a new goldfish. Those are the kind of jokes littering the film and, quite honestly, the production is better for it. There´s no need to sully the good name of the original series with poop jokes or double entendres.
Humorous sequences, both big and small, run throughout the film. No character is adverse to being included in the fun, from Chief (Alan Arkin, who surprisingly gets a lot of screen time in the finale) to Terence Stamp as the leader of evil organization KAOS. While most of the comedy works, two techs in the CONTROL headquarters come off as gratuitous, unnecessary and ultimately banal. It´s not the fault of actors Masi Oka and Nate Torrence; their characters, Bruce and Lloyd, are designed to be comic relief when the movie doesn´t need any comic relief. (It should be noted these two are spun off in their own direct to DVD movie, most likely explaining their inclusion here.)
However, this is Carell´s movie to carry, comedy wise. His deadpan delivery and complete allegiance to the material transcends whatever stupidity Smart goes through, allowing us to see he isn´t consciously trying to be funny (like an Adam Sandler). In effect, this makes him the best "name" actor to take the role. It´s enough the script by Tom Astle and Matt Ember packs enough jokes into every scene; Carell doesn´t need to do anything but keep a straight face and recite lines.
The other component to his performance is Hathaway. She comes off as having to be the mother figure here, not allowed to have much fun. In fact, it is only through a dancing sequence do we see her face light up. But there remains a trueness to her, underneath all the fancy outfits and gadgets and responsibility. If there is one deficiency in the roe, it is the lack of development for Agent 99. With the exception of one scene, all her dialogue revolves around Smart, depriving us of getting to actually know her in any meaningful way. On the upside, this gives a potential sequel a lot of territory to explore.
I have to comment, for just a moment, about the middle of the movie. As Smart and 99 scurry around Russia, we presume Chief and an entire cast of characters (including The Rock´s Agent 23) are performing support functions back at CONTROL. After all, when Jack Bauer is out in the field, we check in with Chloe and the rest of the CTU gang every couple of minutes. The script completely forgets about the secondary characters, opting to show them continuing to recover from a KAOS attack to being fully operational. Couldn´t a couple scenes have been thrown in showing Bruce, Lloyd or Chief getting electrocuted by a malfunctioning computer? Something to remind us of the people left behind.
My other concern with the script is it tips its hand far, far too early. Maybe it´s a symptom of the genre it´s working in, but every single spy story has an inevitable mole. "24" is notorious for having poor human resources vetting for its government workers, so it should come as no shock here how the film actually ends. All we get is a ten second snippet of a phone call between Siegfried (that´s Stamp) and his boss-voice electronically masked, of course-and I pinned down who the ultimate bad guy would end up being. It goes hand in hand with being away from CONTROL for so long.
I´m not usually one to criticize a director´s choices, but Peter Segal needs to figure how to inject energy into physical action sequences. Specifically, how not to have a thousand different edits inside of two minutes of film. A fight involving Smart, 99 and a Russian baddie is despicable with its intense close ups of legs flying, bodies tumbling backward and a flurry of other movements. We´ve never able to get a handle on who is doing what to whom, leading to a very boring scene. (I´m not apt to blame editor Richard Pearson since he has worked on the latest Bourne film, the big screen version of "Rent" and "United 93," among other films, none of which had this issue.)
Which brings us back to the story itself. There´s only an A-plot, nothing else. No tangents, nothing to make the movie richer or deeper. In a way, that´s okay. With no superfluous fluff to divert our attention from the main plot, "Get Smart" tends to be a tight production, aside from the already mentioned issue of Bruce and Lloyd. The plot may not be terribly deep or hold the answers to the universe (or even be particularly inspired), but it doesn´t need to. Much like "The Incredible Hulk" or even "Iron Man," "Get Smart" has no ambition to change the world. Only to provide some sort of entertainment for a certain amount of time. And on that count, the finished product succeeds in spades.
This is a fun little flick, very close to being family friendly, with only one repeated curse word that I recall. There is no blood and only one potential obstacle for nudity. A little dense for younger kids and not full of slapstick comedy like "Kung Fu Panda," "Get Smart" would work for anyone over the age of 12, I think. As such, it gets a 6 out of 10. What can I say? I laughed my ass off the entire time.