Get Smart
Genre: TV cult classic/spy/comedy
Director: Peter Segal
Run time: 110 minutes
Rating: PG-13

The Lowdown: The shoe phone. The cone of silence. The eternal struggle of Chaos versus Control.

“Get Smart” the television show was a subversive unraveling of all things Bond, James Bond when it was unleashed on viewers in the 1960s. It featured smart dialogue, hilarious performances and enough outlandish plots and gadgets to fuel a successful four-year run.

“Get Smart” the movie isn’t nearly as smart as it needs to be. By trying to please both long-time fans of the show and young ticketbuyers who wouldn’t know Don Adams if he was sitting next to them on a bus, the long-gestating film adaptation sputters forth unevenly for much of its nearly two-hour time.

The one thing it has going for it, though, is Steve Carell and he single-handedly keeps the movie afloat even as it drags. Carell is just plain funny. He’s got an everyman, underdog demeanor coupled with a sensitive yet mischievious face that makes you chuckle at the most simple of gags.

He’s equally believable as the ignorant boob or the guy whose luck just saved his butt, and as Maxwell Smart, he’s asked to play both roles.

If only everyone around him was as good. Alan Arkin doesn’t come alive until the last third of the movie, during an extended and actually exciting airplane/car/train chase. Dwayne Johnson is criminally underused, but his few scenes sparkle. Masi Oka is not nearly as funny or as endearing as he is in NBC’s “Heroes,” and his Control tech-geek character fails to generate many laughs. And why he and co-tech geek Nate Torrence got their own direct-to-DVD spin-off is a mystery.  Anne Hathaway looks gorgeous and kicks butt really well, but her character feels under-developed. And poor Terrence Stamp – why isn’t anyone giving this guy plum roles like “The Limey” anymore?

Oddly, “Get Smart” sputters most when it’s neck-deep in the spy stuff early on. As Carell and Hathaway make their way across Russia, the film just feels flat. But once they return to the U.S., suddenly the movie begins to click.

It’s still too wildly uneven to be considered a great cult classic reinterpretation of a great cult classic. But, given it’s $100-million-plus box office draw, they may get a chance to make things right with an inevitable sequel. Let’s hope it’s “Get Smarter.”

The Stuff You Care About:
Hot chicks – Anne Hathaway – the jury is still out. Sometimes, she’s hot. Sometimes, she’s not. Here, she’s definitely hot when she kicks butt.
Nudity – Hello, PG-13. Steve Carell does kiss The Rock, er Dwayne Johnson. Wrestling fans no longer smell what he’s cooking.
Gore – Carell swallows a blow dart, shoots himself in the face with a mini-crossbow and gets the crap beaten out of him, but never bleeds.
Drug use – I wonder if the Cone of Silence has a ventilation system, kind of like the smokeless ashtray.
Bad Guys/Killers – Terrence Stamp, knee before Zod. Your’s uber-villian Siegfried lacks bite.
Buy/Rent – Not nearly as funny as hoped for, this is a definite rental that won’t disappoint but it’s not a title you’re going to watch multiple times.
On the Web – http://getsmartmovie.warnerbros.com/
Release Date – Nov. 4, 2008