Directed By Peter Segal

Starring – Dave Bautista, Chloe Coleman, Kristen Schaal

The Plot – MY SPY follows JJ a hardened CIA operative (Bautista) who has been demoted and finds himself at the mercy of a precocious 9-year-old girl, named Sophie (Coleman) where he has been sent undercover begrudgingly to surveil her family. When Sophie discovers hidden cameras in her apartment she uses her tech savviness to locate where the surveillance operation is set. In exchange for not blowing JJ’s cover Sophie convinces him to spend time with her and teach her to be a spy. Despite his reluctance JJ finds he is no match for Sophie’s disarming charm and wit.

Rated PG-13 for action/violence and adult language

POSITIVES

– Nourishing dynamic. It’s easy to see that the movie’s success weighs heavily on the blossoming chemistry of Bautista and Coleman, but while both of them bring their best to making this a feel-good experience, it’s the natural approaches to their characters that make you respect them equally as separate entities. For Coleman, it’s the astonishing benefit of having a child actress who isn’t annoying or overdone in her demeanor as a precocious child that not only made this sustainable, but also made her character endearing in an empathetic kind of manner. For Bautista, what he lacks in emotional depth, he more than makes up for with brute charisma and a perfect physical specimen for the action side of things that the film occasionally calls on to earn his believability as a C.I.A agent. The duo bounce off of each other like rubber, and give us one of the more indulging adult/child on-screen friendships that feels every bit as honest and sincere as it does advantageous to the delight of the film and audience.

– Musical selections. Make no mistakes about it, this isn’t me praising the catalogs of Britney Spears or Cardi B, but rather commending the film’s ingenuity for using them in a way that wields the biggest response in comical musical cues. These artists and others make up an eclectic collection of pop culture favorites, but beyond that capture the intention of the film far more subtly and less meandering than the movie’s musical score, which is a bit too on-the-nose for my personal tastes. Above all else, it proves that the film’s production spent an ample amount of dough on some familiar tracks that really only play for a few seconds each, but conjure up an inescapably feel good atmosphere in the heat of the scene that wouldn’t be the same without them. One such scene with Bautista dancing during a date night will summarize everything stated in this positive, as it is one of the longer laughs that I have had in 2020 so far.

– Genre balancing. For all of its tonal intrusions from time to time within the film, it’s the manner in which they mature throughout that is surprisingly beneficial in making an abstract form of media that caters to every crowd of the spectrum. There’s obviously humor, but beyond that a hearty amount of action, romance, and even the occasional dramatic tug at the heartstrings to remind you of the film’s very serious stakes at play. Each of these shifts are realized and earned naturally without it ever feeling like a clashing of worlds that are abruptly stitched together, creating a Frankenstein monster that is uncertain what it is trying to be at any given time. It proves that the movie’s trailer wasn’t exactly an honest piece in marketing its product, and that what resonates underneath the slapstick humor is a creatively ambitious pallet that continuously redefines itself with a no rules approach to filmmaking.

– Characterization. Halfway through the film, we start to comprehend how J.J and Sophie are helping each other simultaneously while just being around each other, and while the latter’s layer-peeling accessibility does present itself in trusting the former with her Mother’s heart, it’s J.J’s ride through the duration of the film that conjures up one of the more clearly defined transformations that I have seen in quite sometime. When we first meet J.J, we are treated to a tight-lipped, no-nonsense disciplinarian with no semblance of family or friends to counteract that focus that exerts on his career. But through the many experiences with his youthful counterpart, we start to see someone whose priorities change, and someone who becomes selfless the more he sees the effects that his mission has on those he cares about. This is made even more impressive with the weakness of Bautista’s acting that I previously mentioned, but the pivotal beats of the story illustrate a protagonist who grows content the more he gives in to the relationships that pop-up around him, and is Segal’s strongest quality as a screenwriter.

– Attention to detail. It’s a small aspect, but I greatly appreciate when a film invests in the believability of its characters, and “My Spy” succeeds on this end with a Mother/Daughter duo that visually feels like they were separated at the hip. Coleman and Parisa Fitz-Henley look practically identical, both in their bushy curls of hair that are the most easily distinguishable feature in their appearances, and their skin complexion, which could cast doubt with even a shed of off-color likeness. Aspects like this don’t often get the credit that they deserve, but casting director Anne McCarthy did such an exceptional job at recognizing these two ladies as family long before the audience ever had a chance to, and it’s one of the many categories that I feel the Oscars should add to when it comes to recognizing the best that film has to offer. If they did, then McCarthy would steal the show with a duo that wipes away the line of plausibility between reality and film that only so many films capture.

– Strong comedy. This film constantly feels like a contemporary adaptation of the “Kindergarten Cop” formula that Arnold and company made popular nearly thirty years ago. Not only in the familiarity of a structure, but also in the edginess of its humor, which often stretches the boundaries and comforts that a PG-13 rating can provide. This separates it from a film like “Playing With Fire”, a movie so mundane with childish humor and lines of dialogue falling under the lunacy department that it often is difficult to take anything on-screen seriously. “My Spy” isn’t of the same caliber, as some gory imagery, suggestive material, and one big F bomb make it feel like anything other than a conventional kids movie. Aside from this, Segal is also wise enough to spoof films of the action genre in the same way his Naked Gun trilogy did over four decades ago. It takes something that would otherwise be cringeworthy, and drives that gag in a completely different direction that makes sure you’re still paying attention.

NEGATIVES

– Lifeless special effects. I wasn’t expecting much in scale when it came to the dazzle of the film’s post-production qualities, but what I got created a series of unnecessarily glaring images that feel loaded in computer generated influence. Cheesy greenscreen involving explosions, facial inserted likenesses into stuntman, and one ridiculously illustrated fish that couldn’t be anymore artificial if it sprouted razor sharp teeth and sang the Macarena. None of what is presented feels like a requirement to the integrity of the scene, nor does it feel justifiably rendered as a finished product that they decided to go with at release time. It clouds the execution to scenes that should’ve required a simplistic approach to sell the intentional, and gives the film a cheap quality to its production that it never is able to overcome in other qualities.

– Forgettable action sequences. There are many contributing factors to the film’s three action sequences, that make it feel lukewarm at best towards satisfying a large crowd. The first is the choppy editing, which can be described as a visual firework that reaches for dizziness, when it should be reaching consistency. Continuity is a big problem within this aspect of the film, as many sequences feel like two different takes pasted together. In addition to this, the sometimes handheld design of camera work limits what is detectable by human eyes, sometimes feeling too close in its captures, or too jumpy in its style. Finally, the fight choreography contained doesn’t balance the stakes to feel dramatic enough, or offer anything that is even remotely compelling for the audience to feel invested in. To summarize everything, the flat action is the reason the first and third acts of the movie often search for an identity to cling to, which only further cements the second act of the film’s dominance, for the abundance of heart that never feels manipulative or excessive in the same ways its action does.

– Weak antagonist. For my money, I would’ve been fine if this film didn’t have an antagonist character, and instead the film had J.J and crew looking over the two women for the gift their husband and father respectively, left behind. I say that because there’s almost no time devoted to this character to flesh him out in a way that makes him anything but a conflict filler for J.J’s opposition. Besides the fact that the movie has only 47 minutes left when it finally brings this adversary up, the rendering of his scenes feel unlike anything contained in the film creatively, taking the movie in serious directions to oppose its self-aware status almost entirely. It feeds more into the inescapably predictable factor that much of the movie rests on, and could work so much better if the film’s conflict revolved around J.J’s confinement within himself.

– Leaps of logic. There are many in the film, but my biggest problems comes down within a couple of instances that would never happen in our real world. The first is the bond between J.J and Sophie. A mysterious man just pops up out of nowhere, and spends a lot of time with your daughter, and you’re fine with it? Then there’s the ability that Sophie has to outsmart both of the C.I.A operatives, despite the fact that they seem virtually flawless when conquering any other adversities that doesn’t involve her. Kids rule in a kids movie, yes, but I can’t buy their intelligence for the position if the most vulnerable of entities is constantly one step ahead of them at all times. The last question is why Schaal’s character, an essential rookie to the C.I.A team, would be chosen to be J.J’s partner in a case as important as this one. If you can suspend these kind of logic leaps, congratulations. I however see the holes of logic that persist within, and it makes so much of this essential set-up so difficult to buy into in the first place.

My Grade: 6/10 or C-