''I Spy'' (commonly styled ''I-SPY'') is a 2002 American
buddy
Buddy may refer to:
People
*Buddy (nickname)
*Buddy (rapper), real name Simmie Sims III (1993–Present)
*Buddy Rogers (wrestler), ring name of American professional wrestler Herman Gustav Rohde, Jr. (1921–1992)
*Buddy Boeheim (born 1999), Amer ...
spy
Espionage, spying, or intelligence gathering is the act of obtaining secret or confidential information (intelligence) from non-disclosed sources or divulging of the same without the permission of the holder of the information for a tangib ...
comedy film
A comedy film is a category of film which emphasizes humor. These films are designed to make the audience laugh through amusement. Films in this style traditionally have a happy ending (black comedy being an exception). Comedy is one of the ol ...
directed by
Betty Thomas
Betty Thomas (born Betty Lucille Nienhauser; July 21, 1948) is an American actress, director, and producer. She is known for her Emmy Award-winning role as Sergeant Lucy Bates on the television series '' Hill Street Blues''.
As of March 2018, T ...
, and starring
Eddie Murphy and
Owen Wilson
Owen Cunningham Wilson (born November 18, 1968) is an American actor. He has had a long association with filmmaker Wes Anderson with whom he shared writing and acting credits for '' Bottle Rocket'' (1996), '' Rushmore'' (1998), and '' The Royal ...
. The film is based on the
television series of the same name that aired in the 1960s and starred
Robert Culp
Robert Martin Culp (August 16, 1930 – March 24, 2010) was an American actor widely known for his work in television. Culp earned an international reputation for his role as Kelly Robinson on ''I Spy'' (1965–1968), the espionage television se ...
and
Bill Cosby
William Henry Cosby Jr. ( ; born July 12, 1937) is an American stand-up comedian, actor, and media personality. He made significant contributions to American and African-American culture, and is well known in the United States for his eccentric ...
. The plot follows a spy and a famous civilian boxer who go undercover to prevent a
gun runner
Arms trafficking or gunrunning is the illicit trade of contraband small arms and ammunition, which constitutes part of a broad range of illegal activities often associated with transnational criminal organizations. The illegal trade of small ...
from selling a stolen
stealth bomber
Stealth aircraft are designed to avoid detection using a variety of technologies that reduce reflection/emission of radar, infrared, visible light, radio frequency (RF) spectrum, and audio, collectively known as stealth technology. The F-117 Nig ...
to the highest bidder.
The film was released in the United States on November 1, 2002. It received generally negative reviews from critics, and only grossed $60 million against its $70 million production budget.
Plot
At Bureau of National Security headquarters, Special Agent Alex Scott is accosted by rival, Carlos, before his next mission's briefing. Scott has to recover a stolen fighter, the "Switchblade," sold to arms dealer Arnold Gundars.
Gundars is sponsoring middleweight world boxing champion Kelly Robinson's next match to simultaneously auction the plane. The agency has contacted Robinson and assigned him to be a civilian cover for Scott's mission. Together they travel to Budapest, where Scott plans to penetrate Gundars' compound during a pre-fight party.
Arriving in Budapest, Robinson is kidnapped. During the interrogation Scott bursts in, frees him, and fights the kidnappers before revealing it was a test which Kelly passed by not divulging Scott's identity.
At Gundars' party, Robinson replaces Gundars' pen with a duplicate with a tracking device before confronting his European challenger in the party's boxing ring as a diversion. Scott, posing as a member of Robinson's entourage, enters Gundars' private office and hacks his computer. Robinson unexpectedly arrives, tripping an alarm. They are forced to escape and manage to evade their pursuers by hiding in the sewer.
Returning to base, Robinson helps Scott seduce Agent Rachel Wright by feeding him lines from the
Marvin Gaye song "
Sexual Healing
"Sexual Healing" is a song recorded by American singer Marvin Gaye from his seventeenth and final studio album, '' Midnight Love'' (1982). It was his first single since his exit from his long-term record label Motown earlier in the year, followi ...
". Scott succeeds, but is interrupted by movement on the pen tracking device. He tracks Gundars to a bathhouse, which Scott believes is a dead end. Robinson has a hunch that the plane is hidden in the building, leading them into a fight with Gundars' men. Gundars speeds off in his car, with Wright in pursuit. Her car explodes and Scott blames Robinson for her death. They engage in a public confrontation leading to Robinson's arrest. Scott convinces BNS to continue the operation and tracks Gundars down again.
Robinson reaches the arena just in time for his fight. Scott finds Gundars with terrorists, fitting the plane with a nuclear missile. He surprises them, forcing a surrender, before being disarmed by double Agent Wright. She tortures Scott for the Switchblade's activation codes. Activating the contact lens gadget allows Robinson to see the dilemma as he battles his opponent in the ring. He gets knocked down for the first time in his career, but recovers, defeats his opponent, and heads for the bridge.
Robinson sets off a firefight, killing many of the terrorists. After Carlos lands by parachute, he infers that Carlos is also corrupt. When Carlos provokes Kelly, he knocks him out. Robinson shoots the remaining terrorists, while their leader, Zhu Tam, and Gundars are both killed by Wright. After the bomb on the plane is destroyed, Robinson tells Rachel to put the gun down.
Wright fabricates a lie that the BNS suspected Carlos was corrupt, so they pretended to team up with him to catch him and convince the others that she is innocent. The confusion leads to a fight between Scott and Carlos, allowing Wright to escape with Gundars' briefcase. Scott and Robinson attempt to fly the Switchblade away, but it crashes into the river. While in the water, Robinson discovers the nuclear weapon. Scott realizes the mission is a success after all, and Robinson remarks that he will be recognized as a hero.
Later, Scott and Robinson track down and arrest Agent Wright in Monte Carlo. Scott finds a copy of USA Today with a picture of Carlos in a parade with President Bush. Robinson takes this news hard, refusing to accompany Scott to BNS headquarters for a mission debrief. Scott tells him the agency has perfected a jelly-like substance which allows its wearer to float through the air. Robinson happily agrees to go, and Scott tells another agent to get some jars of jelly and two parachutes.
Cast
*
Owen Wilson
Owen Cunningham Wilson (born November 18, 1968) is an American actor. He has had a long association with filmmaker Wes Anderson with whom he shared writing and acting credits for '' Bottle Rocket'' (1996), '' Rushmore'' (1998), and '' The Royal ...
as Special Agent Alex Scott
*
Eddie Murphy as Kelly Robinson
*
Famke Janssen
Famke Beumer Janssen (; born ) is a Dutch actress. She played Xenia Onatopp in '' GoldenEye'' (1995), Jean Grey / Phoenix in the ''X-Men'' film series (2000–2014), and Lenore Mills in the ''Taken'' film trilogy (2008–2014). In 2008, she ...
as Special Agent Rachel Wright
*
Malcolm McDowell
Malcolm McDowell (born Malcolm John Taylor; 13 June 1943) is a British actor, producer, and television presenter. He is best known for portraying Alex DeLarge in ''A Clockwork Orange.'' He was born in the Horsforth suburb of Leeds and raised i ...
as Arnold Gundars
*
Gary Cole
Gary Michael Cole (born September 20, 1956) is an American television, film and voice actor. Cole began his professional acting career on stage at Chicago's Steppenwolf Theatre Company in 1985. On television, he has had starring roles in the ...
as Agent Carlos
*
Bill Mondy
Bill Mondy, sometimes credited as Bill Monday, is an American film and television actor.
Career
He is best known for his appearances in '' Star Trek: Deep Space Nine'' (in the episode " Armageddon Game") and '' The Dead Zone''. He also made gu ...
as Mack McIntyre
*
Phill Lewis
Phillip David Lewis (born February 14, 1968) is an American actor, comedian and director who is best known for his role as hotel manager Mr. Moseby on the Disney Channel series ''The Suite Life of Zack & Cody'' and its spin-off, ''The Suite Lif ...
as Jerry
*
Mike Dopud
Mike Dopud ( sr, Majk Dopuđ, ''Мајк Допуђ'') is a Canadian actor, stuntman, and former football player known for his supporting roles on television. His best-known roles include Vic Hadfield in the miniseries ''Canada Russia '72'', Ja ...
as Jim
*
Lynda Boyd
Lynda Boyd (born January 28, 1965) is a Canadian actress, singer, dancer, musician, and writer. She is perhaps best known for her roles in the films '' Final Destination 2'' (2003), '' An Unfinished Life'' (2005), ''She's the Man'' (2006), and ' ...
as Edna
* Dana Lee as Zhu Tam
* Viv Leacock as T.J.
*
Crystal Lowe
Yan-Kay Crystal Lowe (born Yan-Kay Lo; January 20, 1981) is a Canadian actress, director, and model best known for her scream queen roles in horror films such as '' Children of the Corn: Revelation'' (2001), '' Final Destination 3'' (2006), '' ...
as Beautiful Girl
*
Darren Shahlavi
Darren Majian Shahlavi (5 August 1972 – 14 January 2015) was an English actor, martial artist and stuntman.
Shahlavi was known primarily for in martial arts films such as '' Bloodmoon'', '' Tai Chi Boxer'', the 2010 film '' Ip Man 2'', '' B ...
as Cedric Mills
*
Gábor Demszky
Gábor Demszky (born 4 August 1952) is a Hungarian politician, lawyer and sociologist by qualification. Demszky was the Mayor of Budapest from 1990 to 2010. He was a founding member of the Alliance of Free Democrats (SZDSZ) between 1988 and 20 ...
as Himself
Release
Made on a $70 million budget, the film brought in $33.6 million domestically and $26.7 million internationally, for a total of $60.3 million worldwide.
[ It was the third ]box office bomb
A box-office bomb, or box-office disaster, is a film that is unprofitable or considered highly unsuccessful during its theatrical run. Although any film for which the production, marketing, and distribution costs combined exceed the revenue after ...
of 2002 for Murphy, following ''Showtime
Showtime or Show Time may refer to:
Film
* ''Showtime'' (film), a 2002 American action/comedy film
* ''Showtime'' (video), a 1995 live concert video by Blur
Television Networks and channels
* Showtime Networks, a division of Paramount Global w ...
'' and ''The Adventures of Pluto Nash
''The Adventures of Pluto Nash'' is a 2002 American science fiction action comedy film directed by Ron Underwood and starring Eddie Murphy (in a dual role), Randy Quaid, Rosario Dawson, Joe Pantoliano, Jay Mohr, Luis Guzmán, James Rebhorn, Peter B ...
''.
Reception
Review aggregator
A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews of products and services (such as films, books, video games, software, hardware, and cars). This system stores the reviews and uses them for purposes such as supporting a website where users ...
Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...
reports that 16% of 134 critics have given the film a positive review; the average rating was 4.1/10. The site's critics consensus reads: "Insipid and mirthless, ''I Spy'' bears little resemblance to the TV series that inspired it." Metacritic
Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...
assigned the film a weighted average score of 35 out of 100, based on 31 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B" on an A+ to F scale.
Roger Ebert of the ''Chicago Sun-Times
The ''Chicago Sun-Times'' is a daily newspaper published in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Since 2022, it is the flagship paper of Chicago Public Media, and has the second largest circulation among Chicago newspapers, after the ''Chicago T ...
'' rated it two out of four stars and wrote, "This is a remake by the numbers, linking a halfwit plot to a series of standup routines in which Wilson and Murphy show how funny they could have been in a more ambitious movie."
The film was nominated for three Razzie Awards
The Golden Raspberry Awards (also known as the Razzies and Razzie Awards) is a parody award show honoring the worst of cinematic under-achievements. Co-founded by UCLA film graduates and film industry veterans John J. B. Wilson and Mo Murphy, ...
: Worst Remake, Worst Actor for Eddie Murphy, and Worst Screen Couple for Murphy and Owen Wilson.
References
External links
*
*
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{{Betty Thomas
2002 films
2002 action comedy films
American action comedy films
American buddy comedy films
American buddy cop films
Columbia Pictures films
2000s English-language films
Films based on television series
Films directed by Betty Thomas
Films produced by Andrew G. Vajna
Films scored by Richard Gibbs
Films shot in Budapest
C2 Pictures films
2000s spy comedy films
2000s buddy comedy films
2000s buddy cop films
American spy comedy films
2002 comedy films
2000s American films