Old Stuff
Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery (1997)
Directed by James L. Brooks
I have to admit that when I heard the premise for "Austin Powers", I thought it was a terrible idea. How is it going to parody a genre that's has turned into parody all by itself? I was wrong. Mike Myers is great as the yellow-toothed refugee from London's swinging sixties. The movie is on target as a send up of the "Bond" and "In Like Flint" films of the same era, but it also works as a fish-out-of-water story as the upbeat, sexually liberated Austin is let loose in the downbeat, uptight nineties. Myers is even better as Austin's nemesis, Dr. Evil. The interactions between Dr. Evil and his disaffected teenage son (Seth Green) are classic. When Dr. Evil has Austin Powers at his mercy, sonny-boy is eager to get a glock and do the honors, but in the grand Bond tradition, Dr. Evil puts Powers and cohort Hurley in a tub of sharks. When "Scott" points out that they probably will escape, Dr. Evil chides him for "just not getting it". The whole movie is filled with great gags from opening credits to close. -- Rating $7.50
Tom Graney -- copyright 1997 Hollywood Outsider