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If this film has any relation to the old television series of the same name, I Spy, my name is Montague Montague.

I Spy, the television series had Robert Culp and Bill Cosby in the professional tennis world also serving as spies for the United States. Sports brought them into various situations the normal person couldn't attain. In this film, Owen Wilson and Eddie Murphy play the starring roles as the professional spy and pseudo-spy-champion-boxer who reluctantly team for an espionage job. Wilson is the spy and has to retrieve a stolen plane with a cloaking device (are you listening, Klingons?). In order to get into the upper echelon in Budapest where the plane may be hidden, he joins the entourage of champion boxer Eddie Murphy. This lends itself to many jokes about who is the boss. In the meantime, I Spy spoofs the Bond films by having Wilson always comes up short in his assignments to top spy, Carlos (an unrecognizable Gary Cole). Wilson's gadgets don't work and he seems to have second-hand equipment resembling yard sale products. Wilson has a crush on love interest/spy Famke Janssen, but she seems to think Carlos is worth sighing about.

I Spy does have good moments in it. There is a chase scene in which our guys are atop a truck with a load of cars and they manage to dismantle the rig while driving over a bridge. The boxing scenes look real enough and Murphy is certainly in top shape here. Running gags include the who-is-really-boss-here routine, Murphy coaching Wilson in making a play for Janssen, and Murphy "sensing" who is good, who is bad and getting it wrong.

The dialogue is witty a great deal of the time, though Wilson rambles on and Murphy acts like he's getting ready for a stand-up comic routine. The two stars don't seem to have bonding ability and though they try hard, it just isn't there. Wilson's lackluster reinforces his second-best spy appearance, while Murphy's ego is always on display so that Wilson takes a backseat even though he is a co-star.

Which brings me to the awkward points. Murphy comes to Budapest with the obligatory entourage but they disappear and we never see them again. While trying to hide in a sewer, Wilson and Murphy have shirts that are buttoned and unbuttoned. Wilson looks as though make-up over-did the lip-gloss. It's another film where dozens of bullets are shot at the guys and miss, while Wilson takes a backhanded aim and hits the target. It becomes a game for the audience to name the films this film incorporates including every James Bond film and even Mission Impossible. I would have preferred a fight scene with Wilson ringside, less psychobabble between the two stars, more of Malcolm McDowell as the villan and less of expressionless Janssen. The elongated scene in the private jet could have been dispensed with.

All in all, I Spy is an amusing comedy with a few clever points such as the dialogue at the beginning of the film between Murphy and "The President," the guys trying to escape via a small balloon and Murphy purposely drawing attention to himself at a party. A better title for the film would have been, I Fly.

Copyright 2002 Marie Asner 11/6/2002