Review of Get Smart (2008) by Markb. — 23 Jul 2008

At this point, Steve Carell can do no wrong. His on-screen sweetness and vulnerability (along with the incomparable Catherine Keener's terrific work) made his breakthrough movie, The 40 Year Old Virgin, not just a very funny raunchfest but a surprisingly affecting romance with characters you really rooted for; on his TV series The Office, his Michael Scott is amazingly gauche and clueless, but he makes you understand why Jan (Melora Walters) falls for him anyway, even though by all standards he spent a lot of time sexually harassing her.

Carell made his two 2007 films, the somewhat overblown special effects comedy Evan Almighty and the not-quite-as-adult-as-it-thinks-it-is comedy-drama Dan In reeal life, far more watchable than they would've been without him.

Pauline Kael's description of Austin Pendleton's fugitive anarchist in Billy Wilder's 1974 version of The Front Page as a rabbit on the railroad tracks paralyzed by the oncoming train fits Carell perfectly, and that's why casting him in Don Adams' role as the eager but inept secret agent Maxwell Smart in this filmization of the beloved 1960s sitcom is a stroke of genius.

Adams, while amusing, was also deliberately stilted and not quite recognizably human, effectively parodying a square-jawed hero type by playing him not so much as a caricature but as an abstraction; Carell brings the humanity.

More problematic is Anne Hathaway in Barbara Feldon's role as Agent 99, although it's not Hathaway's fault; she's a charming actress who can play somewhat unlikable characters, as she proved as Jake Gyllenhaal's somewhat shallow wife in Brokeback Mountain, but through most of this movie she's required to display utter contempt for Max.

Even allowing for the fact that the big-screen Get Smart, like the first installments of most comic book superhero movies, is an origin story, it's too much and too unpleasant a departure from what made Feldon's characterization so winning: while Agent 99 was far more skilled at her job than Agent 86 was, she stepped back and let him think he was better than he was because she adored him.

(And by the way, Feldon occupies a unique, almost singular niche as virtually the only 1960s sex symbol to be one entirely through charm, personality and THAT VOICE rather than revealing attire; correct me if I'm wrong, but through the entire run of the series, I don't think Feldon ever even bared her shoulders.

) Nevertheless, the movie is mostly good if undemanding fun; director Peter Segal (The Naked Gun 33 1/3, The Nutty Professor 2: The Klumps) isn't a comic visionary like Frank Tashlin or Blake Edwards; he's more of a Norman Taurog, a competent pro who puts established stars through their paces and knows where to put the camera while doing so.

(However, I'd still rather sit through any of Taurog's lazy, late-career Elvis musicals than any of Segal's Adam Sandler movies again; Anger Management, 50 First Dates and The Longest Yard seemed to bring out the worst in both of them.

) Segal orchestrates both comedy and action scenes well, gets enjoyable performances from Alan Arkin, David Koechner and a wonderfully droll The Ro--er, Dwayne Johnson, and stages a delightful dance sequence that will leave those of us who don't look like supermodels (that is, about 99.

9% of us) beaming.