Balek's Movie Review™ - Get Smart

Remakes of old movies or TV shows always make me nervous.  Doubly so when the original was what many would consider a classic.  We have seen it happen time and time again when a directors desire to relive their childhood favorites falls apart as they mix in the latest and greatest in special effects, the wrong cast, or just make changes all together with the source material.  However, every now and then, we're treated to a situation when it's done right.  Thankfully, the resurrection of Maxwell Smart onto the big screen was done with reverence and admiration to the 60s television classic, making it a worthy successor.

Get Smart was originally the brain child of Mel Brooks and Buck Henry, and gave the public a comedy series that satirized the secret agent genre.  People had been living with James Bond's perfect accent, perfect gadgets, and perfect spy skills for far too long, and needed some Agent 86 in their lives.  Originally played by Don Adams to perfect, Maxwell Smart was a bumbling paper pusher within CONTROL, a super secret government agency, with aspirations of reaching rank of agent and battling against the ever-menacing KAOS, the international organization of evil.  Backed up by always sexy Agent 99 and the sarcastic, grumpy Chief, Smart always seemed to reach his goals, but in the most awkward, almost stupid fashion.  And it was funny as hell.

In the most recent adaptation, Smart is played expertly by Steve Carell and Agent 99 by Anne Hathaway.  Both do their predecessors justice.  Carell is this generations master of awkward, and I could think of no other actor alive I would rather see play Agent 86.  Even the trademark catchphrases were executed with precision and perfection - if you closed your eyes, you'd easily see Adams speaking the lines.  While I was leery of Hathaway as Agent 99 at first due to her age and relatively light experience, she conveyed both dominance of and bewilderment over Smart throughout the film.  The chemistry was a bit awkward and not wholly believable, but I'll dismiss that as a small blemish on an otherwise perfectly acted film.  And did I mention she's hot?    The movie was shot in part in Moscow, and the ambience transferred well to the screen and gave a sense of authenticity to the faux Cold War that is still going on within the movie.  Music and special effects are well done, with several fight scenes that would almost get me calling this an action film - it missed it by that much.

Ultimately, Get Smart hits the mark for a good, light comedy flick that is fun and entertaining.  It certainly will not be listed with the best of the genre by any stretch of the imagination, but fans of the original series will appreciate the effort laid out to stay true to its heritage, and will be taken back to a time when funny didn't have to be - would you believe - rude, crude, or explicit in nature.