Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me (1999)

**Despite Mike Myers' efforts, the film is nothing new, has a stupid, poorly written story, and isn't funny.**

After a great success with the first film, the sequel became quite easy to predict. It was obvious that they were going to try to make a second movie that continued the story, and tried to raise some more money from the box office. I'm not a fan of this kind of humor, too scatological and sexual, but I think this movie was frankly worse than its immediate predecessor.

The biggest problem with this film is not even the dirty, stupid jokes and zero sense of humor, but a poorly written script, without original ideas and quite tiring. The film's story is very simple to summarize: Austin Powers, single and free again, finally realizes that Dr. Evil, years before, used a time machine to steal his manhood while he was frozen. For a man as perverted and quinky as Powers, being without what he calls a “mojo” is simply catastrophic. So he has to use another time machine, go back to the 60s and try to stop Dr. Evil in order to regain his masculinity. Sound really stupid? Maybe because it is! And I prefer not to mention the ending, where we have two versions of the main agent, and we came to the conclusion that it was never really necessary to recover his virility. In addition to being stupid, the movie is also pointless.

Myers continues to assure the main characters of the film, that is, the protagonist, the great villain and a deformed criminal who is nothing more than a bunch of Scottish lard (do Scots feel offended by such a caricature?). He is a good actor, I have no doubt that he is committed to his work. However, the rest of the cast is uninteresting, tiresome and doesn't seem to have any ideas or even try to add anything else to the production that can increase its quality. Heather Graham is beautiful, but not very good as an actress, and the film saved her from spending the rest of her career making adult films. Seth Green also tries to do something witty and interesting, but he's short on time and quality material. Finally, a note of praise for Verne Troyer and Mindy Sterling.

Technically, the film is quite weak. It plays a lot with the colorful and flashy look of the 60's, and that's the most beautiful and elegant aspect of the whole movie. I liked the costumes, the sets and the characterization, in particular Myers, chameleonic and skilled in the various characters he plays (in fact, the film was nominated for an Oscar in the Characterization category). The cinematography also seeks to take advantage of and emphasize the visual beauty that exists here, while the editing sought to give the film a rhythm that was not tiring. I can't say that the efforts were in vain, the film would be unbearable if it were slower.

In my opinion this is the only good one out of the entire series. I was cracking up throughout the whole movie. The other 2 sucked compared to this one.

Offering his best impersonation of Charles Grey, "Dr. Evil" (Mike Myers) has escaped from prison and is determined to rob the man who put him there - "Austin Powers" (also Myers) of the source of his legendary charisma. He has schemed and plotted with his number two (Robert Wagner), his own personal "Frau" (Mindy Sterling) and the conniving Scotsman "Fat Bastard" (yep, Myers too) to go back in time and steal the very mojo that makes "Powers" the ultimate hybrid of Sir Michael Caine and Sir Sean Connery! Meantime, "Powers" is cavorting round 1960s London enjoying his time with the ladies and solving the odd major international crime. He isn't prepared for the criminal mastermind's plan, though, and soon devoid of his libidinal potency is reduced to little more than a pathetic version of his former self. Now he has to get a grip, track down his nemesis and thwart his plan to absorb what he has stolen to make himself invincibly irresistable! What chance? I'm a Scot so didn't love his crude representation of "Fat Bastard" - there are stereotypes and then there are stereotypes, and although there is some fun from the other somewhat episodically presented series of skits, I found the humour a little too puerile as the me and mini-me joke began to wear a bit thin after a while. What did strike me was just how effectively Rob Lowe managed to mimic Robert Wagner and Sterling the menacing Lotte Lenya but neither really feature enough to compensate for the over-exposure of the comedy talents of a man who just doesn't really make me laugh. It's not a bad film and it's fairly shameless parodies of everything from "U.N.C.L.E." to "007" do work from time to time, but I reckon this sequel was just too tired by midway through and despite some sterling work from the time-shifting make up folks this didn't really fly for me.