Remember push-ups? Those little cardboard tubes of ice-cream with the plunger on one end with which you worked the technicolor treat up to the top? Get Smart is pretty much the cinematic version of a push-up. It’s colorful, it’s yummy, it won’t fill you up in the slightest and half an hour after you’ve had it you’ll probably forget that you ate anything at all, but still, while it lasts, it’s glorious.
As seemed to be a trend in my film-going choices this past week, the story here is far from original. In fact, it’s tromping on very formulaic ground, but in contrast to The Incredible Hulk (see review below), somehow the whole thing works. You may hate yourself afterwards for getting sucked into the giddiness, but somehow the enthusiasm of the actors and the sheer number of jokes flying about make it worth it. Steve Carell plays, well, Steve Carell; The Rock plays, erm, The Rock; Anne Hathaway is hot; Alan Arkin is a total old-guy bad-ass; and yet, somehow, this combination of artificial ingredients is just what is needed to make a scrumptiously fluffy confection. Everyone here plays to their strengths which are, in large part, the personae already established in other movies, TV shows, and the media, but it works. If you’re snobbish about only liking “worthwhile” or “meaningful” comedies, you might hate yourself afterwards, but Get Smart is decidedly infectious in its good-natured humor.
None of this is to say that all of the jokes hit the mark -- there are indeed a fair number that thud -- but the overall saturation of gags is high enough that one may forgive a clunker or two. This is by no means high comedy, but neither is it cruel. I have a huge amount of respect for comedy that respects its characters. At some point, I shall rant about the cruelty of comedy and why Ben Stiller/Vince Vaughn/Jack Black movies tend to be painful rather than funny, but for now it shall suffice to say that humane comedy is wonderfully heartening. As Paul writes in his review, one of the big changes from the original TV show to the film adaptation is that the scriptwriters here have turned Maxwell Smart from an incompetent bungler into a guy who’s qualified (in some instances over-qualified) but still an inveterate doofus. This alteration works in the movie’s favor in multiple ways, but the one thing it never allows us to do is laugh AT Smart. We may laugh with him and laugh for him, but it’s never derogatory or derisive.
Another thing that struck me about the comedy in Get Smart is that there were surprisingly few bathroom or blue-humor jokes. There are a few painful moments (a miniature bow and arrows should not be used in enclosed spaces, FYI), but there are, I am pretty sure, no crotch shots or poo jokes. This should not be a striking factor in a movie, but given America’s fetish for the juvenile and the gross as being the standard in “funny”, it is. Steve Carell’s bum, however, is still fair game. I said the bar was higher than some: I didn’t say by how much.
Overall, this movie is a perfect example of what happens when funny people seem to be having fun making a movie. The script itself is not that good; the movie itself is not that good; the chemistry of the actors and the joy they seem to take in playing through the (mostly trite) situations in which they are placed is very, very good.
Yea, it’s full of artificial ingredients, it’s probably not very good for you, but man, some hot summer days just call for a sweet and fluffy guilty pleasure. Nostalgic ice-cream treats or Get Smart... they both hit the spot.
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