Woah, that's a bad guy, that's a really bad guy! Did you see his face? His head looks like one of the Easter Island heads!

Get Smart

(2008)

Weird film. Steve Carrell is very good, for what it's worth, and seems to be in an entirely different film to everyone else from the director down. Peter Segal seems to think he's shooting an actual Bond film, which doesn't seem to me to be the way to go with Smart, since it's always been intentionally broad and hyper-real.

Apparently Carrell did a pass on the script, so presumably it was even less of a comedy before he was involved. There's a nice dancing sequence with a hefty dancing partner, a good piece of psychologising of a villainous henchman and some decent physical comedy, but there's little for him to play off and few sparring partners for him to challenge (with the honourable exception of Alan Arkin, unsurpassable as ever). Even Terence Stamp is wasted.

There's a brief taste of how lunatic the film could have become in Bill Murray’s cameo as Agent 13, but it's annoying in that it occurs early on and leaves you wanting more. Which you never get.

**1/2

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