Austin Powers - Il controspione

'Austin Powers' is a very hilarious film. I liked Dr. Evil and Mr. Biggelsworth (Dr. Evils freaky hairless cat) the best. They rocked!

The plot is very creative... Austin Powers (a swinging 60's spy that poses as a fashion photographer by day) tries to foil Dr. Evil's (also played by Mike Meyers) plan to make all the volcanoes in the world explode with a nuclear warhead. Vanessa Kensington (Elizabeth Hurley) is his partner that helps him out. They have a great and funny chemistry... and the creative semi-nudity is very funny!

Mike Meyers is truly talented.. rent 'Austin Powers' tonight!

My Rating: 9 out of 10

Yeah, it's dumb, yeah it's goofy, but it knows it. Almost everyone in this movie is self-aware of the kind of tropes it is making fun of. It drags out its humor, to a degree that is almost irritating, but it works. It works because of the meta-humor, because of the acknowledgment of the insanity. That makes it that much more fun to watch and hilarious. It's pure laughs and clever writing all through.

In a time when we are almost constantly barraged with goofy spoof films, it's amazing that no one had come out with a spoof of the James Bond films until 1997. Those movies have been coming out and just BEGGING to be spoofed since the early 60s, and Mike Meyers is the one who finally steps forward to do what simply has to be done, and he does a wonderful job at it.

Fans of the James Bond films will have a blast looking for all of the allusions to the old Bond films and trying to determine which Bond film is being spoofed at any given time, but it's important to keep in mind that the film pokes fun at the Bond series in good taste. Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery is never disrespectful to the films that it makes fun of, which is probably the single most important thing about a spoof film that makes it good. This is why the Scary Movies, as just a couple of examples, were such dismal, hideous failures. They try to be funny by viciously making fun of all kinds of movies, and end up looking stupid because they have such a nonexistent right to do that. You can't make a stupid, stupid movie and make fun of a lot of great movies (and some not so great, admittedly) and try to pretend to be respectable at the end of it all. That's the recipe for a crapfest.

While it's true that a lot of the comedy in the first Austin Powers film is slapstick and obviously contrived, I think it should be a testament to the quality of the film that it is still so funny! We see all of the traditional Bond clichés in this movie, such as the usual one-liners (which are made fun of extensively and with spectacular effect here), the fancy cars, the goofy cockiness, the teeth-grinding theme song, and the occasionally inexplicable popularity with the women (this allusion makes most sense when compared to those Bond films that starred Roger Moore).

The plot involves a rivalry between Dr. Evil, an evil mastermind bent on world domination, and Austin Powers, a mockish caricature of James Bond, bent on stopping Dr. Evil's world domination schemes. Meyers portrays both characters with hilarious skill, making Austin an awkward womanizer with some serious dental problems, and Dr. Evil an evil schemer with a hilarious cutesy side. Neither character really seems like they belong in the role that they serve (as a spy and a doctor of evil), which is where a lot of the comedy comes in. There is also, of course the fact that they both spend most of the movie 30 years in their future, completely out of touch with the new world that they live in.

This is not a movie to be taken seriously, and quite frankly, I can't understand all of these reviews that I've read on the IMDb that are constantly complaining that Austin Powers is so cheesy or so childish. I've heard this same complaint about lots of other movies that are also not meant to be taken seriously, but this one is especially confusing. I trust that all you people complaining about how childish Austin Powers is realize that it is a spoof based on a whole series of movies that are also not meant to be taken seriously, right? I mean, that would be a hell of an oversight to miss that little detail. Austin Powers is one of the most refreshing comedies to come along in years, and it's sad that there are so many people who completely missed the boat on this one just because they pretend that the movie is something that it's not and was never meant to be. It's true that the movie is immensely immature and that it has unfortunately little re-watch value (one of the biggest problems with the film), but the quality of the comedy is unmistakable.

When he made Austin Powers: International Man Of Mystery Mike Myers aspired to comic greatness, the kind we had not seen on the screen since Peter Sellers. Only Sellers and Alec Guinness could create so many believable characters in the same film and make them work the way Myers does with Austin Powers and his perennial nemesis Doctor Evil.

Hard to believe, but back in the swinging London of the Sixties, the British kids really did dress like Austin Powers. The key to Powers character is that whether he's in the Sixties or the Nineties, he's still an overgrown kid.

The film is like the old Batman TV series where the Gotham City Police Department is good enough at dealing with ordinary criminals. But when exotic types like the Joker or the Penguin threaten the law and order of Gotham City, Commissioner Gordon reaches for the Batphone and Adam West and Burt Ward start doing their thing in tights.

Powers is on the verge of nabbing Doctor Evil back in the day when the doctor takes off in a rocketship and cryogenically freezes himself. It's also some rocketship if I do say so. Not to be outdone, British Intelligence cryogenically freezes Austin Powers because he's the only man capable of dealing with Evil in their service.

Both men have to adapt to a culture shock. Doctor Evil has mixed feelings about the test tube baby son he fathered in Seth Green. As for Powers, he's not quite fathoming the fact that his Emma Peel like partner Mimi Rogers from back in the day has a daughter in Elizabeth Hurley doing her bit in the family spy business.

Michael York as the M character and Powers boss and Robert Wagner as Number 2 in the Evil Empire both look like they're having a really good time hamming up their parts. There's also a nice unbilled part by Tom Arnold as a cowboy in the men's room with Powers when one of the Evil assassins tries to get him.

A lot of good laughs in this first Austin Powers film, I do so hope Mike Myers does make still another one.

I didn't see this original Austin Powers movie until a year after I saw the sequel, "...The Spy Who Shagged Me." Both involve suspended animation through cryogenics, and set both in the 1960s and the 1990s. In each, Mike Myers plays both the British spy Austin Powers, a spoof of James Bond, and also plays the evil and funny Dr Evil. In both films, some of the funnier scenes are between Dr Evil and his back-talking son.

This movie spoofs lots of different things, has many subtle sexual references, but in the hands (and delivery) of Mike Myers they always come out funny. One of the references, however is not a spoof. The "bad teeth" of the British. They really do have bad teeth! Otherwise, this is not a movie to be taken seriously, just silly entertainment, and there it succeeds almost perfectly.

However, as pretty as she is, Elizabeth Hurley, in this film, is not nearly as entertaining as is Heather Graham in the latter Austin Powers film. Hurley just does not have the comic timing nor the natural "playfulness" that is demanded for the female role. Heather Graham does, and she is even prettier!!

Some day, when they sell a two DVD set of Austin Powers films, I'd like to buy the set.