Ein Käfer gibt Vollgas

The second of five movies director Rudolf Zehetgruber made about a yellow Volkswagen beetle with many gadgets. He played the driver Jimmy Bondi himself under the stage name Robert Mark, but the real star of this movie is Joachim Fuchsberger. Fuchsberger plays Plato, a police agent who is investigating in disguise against gangsters, while Jimmy Bondi just happens to be around and decides to support a bit with Dudu's special powers - which have grown enormously since the first movie. Dudu can now kick enemies unconscious with his movable front lights, for example, or let intruders rotate in his seat. Everything is done in a comedy vein with a memorable running joke: one of the gangsters saying "You think I'm stupid, but I'm not!" while regularly falling into the trap, nevertheless. To me it's the funniest of the 5 movies. I voted 4-7-6-5-3 for the series.

It is a paradoxical situation when one finds a comedy, thats so bad it's actually funny. It requires a lot of laughing in the "wrong places".

Although surely not intended, Ein Käfer gibt Vollgas almost works as a parody of the films it tries to rip off: Disney's Love Bug and it's sequels.

Any sense, plot or genuine intentional hilarity this one has not, but it is somewhat redeemed by the unimitable groovy seventies feel. It sort of reminded me of the seventies Reeperbahn- films in techniques of storytelling, but where the Reeperbahn films had plot just to connect softcore sex scenes together, this one is all bad.

Released on video in Finland in the early eighties.

I can't say I understood this film much, other than it was an odd German takeoff on Herbie. Dodo, the protagonist car, flew, went across water like a boat and did other stuff at the request of his owner, Jimmy Bondi. There was a plot about counterfeiters, I think, and Bondi wanted to avoid this girl who was hot for him.

The scene that sticks out in my mind is Dodo fighting off attackers with car hood and doors, while flashing what I'm sure are German insults on his computer screen.

In the 1970s, German filmmakers - obviously inspired by the huge success of the Disney movie THE LOVE BUG - made several movies about another Beetle with extraordinary abilities. Though this one was painted yellow instead of white, and was computer-powered instead of having a magical personality. This entry in the series, SUPERBUG: SUPER AGENT, is one of the better entries of the series, though if you have seen all of the movies in this series as I have, you'll know that's not saying much.

The main problem I had with the movie was that for the most part it was boring. You would think that this super car would be prominent throughout the movie, but it's actually less prominent than you'd think. There are actually large chunks of the movie where the car is offscreen. Most of the part is focused on some unfunny gangsters up to stuff that as an adult I found both boring and confusing. I can only imagine that kids - who are the primary audience for this movie - will be in agony watching it.

When the car IS in the movie, it's kind of disappointing. There are a couple of okay slapstick fights where the car beats up some human goons, but as for the rest of the car footage, the movie strangely focuses on the car floating on water over and over and over and over and over and over again.

The movie does showcase Portugal somewhat, something I have never seen in a movie (Hollywood or otherwise) before. But overall the movie is not one I would recommend you seek out, on TV or DVD. Speaking of the (American) DVD for the movie, it uses a crummy-looking print (as they did for the other SUPERBUG movies they also released here) that is bleeped for rough language and is missing some footage I remember seeing when I watched the movie on TV years earlier.

SUPERBUG--SECRET AGENT is, I believe, the second of five films in this German SUPERBUG series, which is a takeoff on the HERBIE films of Disney, but which foreshadows KNIGHT RIDER in many ways. The English-dubbed version of this film is what I saw, and it is dubbed in a cartoon-like way that is in keeping with the cartoon-like feel of the film. In fact, on the level of being a "spy" film, this plays out a lot like a Scooby-Doo cartoon, but with live actors and real locations (Portugal, quite lovely and well-filmed!). There is much Stooges/Bowery Boys-style slapstick, and even the usually suave Joachim Fuchsberger (star of many fine Edgar Wallace thrillers in the 60s) finds himself mugging as if he's in an Edgar Kennedy comedy short. Superbug's owner, Jimmy Bondi (played by Robert Mark, who also directed and wrote the film under his real name), is a laid-back unshaven fellow with a cowboy hat, making him a relatively "safe" hero for a children's film. As another comment stated, this film is also quite reminiscent of the Terence Hill-Bud Spencer comedies of the 70s and 80s, with sound effects in the fight scenes and quirky semi-lounge music that immediately cries "foreign" to an American audience. Overall, I found this film quite entertaining as an adult...if you like lowbrow comedy and nice Portuguese locations. Think "a live action Scooby-Doo made in Germany, entertainingly dubbed in English" and you should have a good idea what SUPERBUG--SECRET AGENT has to offer.