I Spy

Starring: Eddie Murphy, Owen Wilson

RS: 1of 4 Stars Average User Rating: 2of 4 Stars

2002 Comedy

I Spy something lazy, slow, shallow, stupid, amateurish, unfunny, unsuspenseful, uninformed, unspeakably dull and witlessly written, directed and acted (the special effects suck, too). It's the movie version of I Spy, the 1960s TV series that scored a racial breakthrough by pairing Robert Culp, as a tennis- pro spy, with Bill Cosby, as his spy trainer.

This time Eddie Murphy plays the athlete (he's a boxer) and Owen Wilson is the spy guy. The racial switch seems to have exhausted the imaginations of the four writers it took to concoct this crap. That leaves Murphy, following the debacle of Pluto Nash, to put another nail in his career coffin, and Wilson, who co-wrote three expert comedies with Wes Anderson (Bottle Rocket, Rushmore, The Royal Tenenbaums), to cough up an excuse for acting in this swill.

Presumably, director Betty Thomas was dozing while the cameras turned. Or am I just being kind?

PETER TRAVERS
(November 14, 2002)