Missed it by that much

"Get Smart:" *** (out of 5)


Warning: here be spoilers!

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With the AC on the fritz, my dad and I decided to take in a movie after dinner. We had both wanted to see "Get Smart," and the timing worked well, so that's what we saw.
It has been eight years since I shut down my movie review service. I want to get in the habit of blogging more, so I thought I'd try writing reviews here. This movie is not an easy one to review, either.
"Get Smart" pretty-much takes its cue from the '60s TV show of the same title. Maxwell Smart (played by Steve Carell) is an analyst from Control who desperately wants to become a field agent. When the terrorist organization Kaos attacks Control Headquarters and steals files with the identities of most of the field agents, he gets his chance.
In the end, Carell holds his own as Smart, and the chemistry between Smart and Agent 99 (Anne Hathaway) is very good. The film also does one thing that the original series never did--it explains how the bumbling Max got to be Agent 86 in the first place.
The real problem with the movie is that it never makes it out of the shadow of the original TV series--which was one of the best shows in the history of television. Two prominent gags in the movie--the fly and the beaded curtain--are lifted straight from the television series, and the cone of silence gets an electronic makeover. There are also nods to the original show--an amusing cameo by Bernie Kopell (the original Siegfried), and a Control Museum that figures prominently. With the museum, however, we do, however, come perilously close to suggesting that there's a new Maxwell Smart and Siegfried in the same universe as the old ones.
The movie also contains some iffy elements. At one point, Siegfried--who is described in the film as the leader of Kaos--gets a call from someone who seems to be his superior, but that idea is never developed. (Sequel setup-perhaps? There does seem to be a spin-off DVD in the can already.) There are also sequences in the film where the Chief (Alan Arkin) is inexplicably violent (and not towards Kaos agents). It also stretches credibility that even an agent as bumbling as Maxwell Smart would use a match to remove gum from his shoe while on an airplane. Some muddled "fat acceptance" messages also appear, but still feel out of place.
The movie does take advantage of the new medium--the stunt sequences go beyond what could readily be done for the TV show. For example, the miniature crossbow and flamethrower on Smart's Swiss Army knife are both put to very good effect. There is also one very funny sight gag at the end that simply could not have been on 1960's TV. The movie definitely earns its PG-13 rating.
I enjoyed "Get Smart." The challenge in reviewing it is that I'm having trouble figuring out how much I enjoyed the movie on its own merits, and how much it was simply making me nostalgic for the superior television show.