The James Bond jetpack \u200bsequence in \u201cThunderball\u201d\u2062 (1965) \u2063was\u2062 a\u2063 cheesy-awesome\u200b thing \u2064that was like, \u2063\u201cWhoa! The future will\u2064 be jetpacks!\u201d \u2062\u201cMy Spy:\u200c The Eternal City\u201d opens \u2063like a Bond film, or maybe a movie whose \u2062goal is to make the \u201cKingsman\u201d series look \u2064weighty. \u200dDave\u2062 Bautista\u2019s JJ, a former Special Forces \u200dsoldier turned CIA operative, is on a private plane, \u200bwhere\u2064 he\u2019s playing \u200cbodyguard \u2062to a teen\u2064 idol named Ryan (Bill Barratt). Out of the blue, he\u2019s \u200battacked \u200dby the \u2063flight attendant. As they go at each \u2063other with sharp objects, a helmeted \u2064figure zips through the sky in a jetpack, placing a bomb on one\u200b of the plane\u2019s \u2063windows\u2063 and blowing a hole in its side; everyone comes tumbling\u200b out, and a plunging-to-the-earth scuffle ensues.<\/p>\n
The hook? The jetpack flier is Sophie (Chloe Coleman), a teenage spy with hair like a tent of frizz. While falling through the air and rescuing JJ, \u200bshe \u200dshouts, \u201cSo for the last time, can \u2063I go to the homecoming dance with Ryan this Saturday?\u201d JJ: \u201cSaturday? You\u2019ve\u2064 got \u2063underwater\u2063 training scheduled!\u201d Peeved, she lets\u200c JJ drop, clinging to\u200c Ryan instead. When he tells \u200bher that he \u2063can\u2019t go to the dance with her because \u2063he\u2019s taking Olivia Rodrigo instead, she drops\u200c him as well. So this is what happened to the James Bond future. Like power-strutting rock \u2018n\u2019 roll and death\u2064 by fashion, it became bratty kicks for\u200d kids.<\/p>\n
Popular on Variety<\/p>\n
Except\u2062 that\u2062 calling\u200d \u201cMy Spy: The Eternal City\u201d a\u200c movie of kicks would\u200c be stretching things. After the\u200d preposterous extravagance of\u200c that opening sequence, the \u2064film settles into a \u200cgeneric groove that makes it seem at times like a \u201cSpy Kids\u201d movie minus the gizmos (and,\u2064 therefore, most of\u200d the fun). This\u200c one comes closer to \u201cCloak and Dagger,\u201d the 1984 thriller, starring Henry Thomas and Dabney\u200b Coleman, that was also a\u2062 wide-eyed chain of\u200c espionage clich\u00e9s gussied up\u200c with\u200d a \u200d\u201cLook! It\u2019s \u2064a\u2063 kids\u2019 movie!\u201d comedy gleam.<\/p>\n
Chloe Coleman, \u200cthe star of the \u201cMy\u200d Spy\u201d films,\u200c is a vivacious actress, \u2062cool on the surface but\u2064 never passive, \u2063and in this sequel \u200dto \u201cMy Spy\u201d (2020), she plays\u200c Sophie as a precocious 14-year-old who now looks askance at JJ, the agent who\u200d trained\u200c her in the ways of\u200c spycraft but \u2063is still figuring out how\u2062 to be her surrogate\u200d dad. (After the events \u200bof\u200c the first film, he \u200bbecame romantic partners with her mom.) Bautista, once again, is the film\u2019s central presence, doing the cuddly-brute thing\u2063 that Arnold used to do;\u2062 pairing him with a kid is supposed to be \u2064a \u200cway\u200b to keep him lovable. Like other wrestler-turned-actors, Bautista might seem \u200dto\u200c be defined by his look \u2014 the \u2064bulk, the glower,\u200b the circus-strongman noggin \u2014 but \u200cit\u2019s really his voice \u200bthat commands. It\u2019s loutish but fast, \u2063as if\u2063 he\u2062 were blurting out each thought to pummel you.<\/p>\n
The film is set mostly in Italy, where JJ is playing chaperone for \u2064Sophie\u2019s \u200dhigh-school choir field trip. As she\u2019s poised in a YA\u200b triangle between selfish dreamboat Ryan and earnest nerd Collin (Taeho \u200bK), JJ just happens to have a run-in with a gang of baddies \u2063presided over by Nancy, an oligarch\u2019s moll\u2064 played by Anna Faris in\u200c wet-look platinum hair and magenta lipstick and racoon eyeshadow. So incensed is she at certain \u200doligarchs having had their fortunes \u2062stripped away \u200bthat there is now a WMD planted under the Vatican. That sounds\u200d serious, but \u200c\u201cMy Spy: The Eternal City\u201d is\u2062 a \u200bmovie \u200din which Ken Jeong, with his\u200d meta flakiness,\u2062 plays the head of \u200dcovert\u2064 operations for the CIA, and in which he and JJ are attacked by a swarm of killer finches.<\/p>\n
The \u2063film\u200b is light enough without\u200b being funny\u2064 enough, most of \u2063it staged, by director \u2063Peter Segal (\u201cTommy Boy,\u201d \u201cThe Naked Gun 33 1\/3\u201d), in\u2062 a kind of generic action overdrive. There\u2019s one unintentionally hilarious line that really captures the current state of \u2062things. We\u200b hear the villain\u2019s electromagnetically disguised voice making threats and demands\u2062 to CIA headquarters: The WMD\u200c will go\u2064 off unless $15 million per \u2064G7 country is paid. \u2064(If it\u2019s not paid, the voice says, there will be\u200c no more \u2063G7.) Then we see Craig Robinson, as a CIA\u2062 operative, respond\u200d by saying,\u2062 \u201cWe\u2019ve\u200b got \u2064to move POTUS, now!\u201d But the way the film has been set up, you think: What does POTUS have to do with \u2064anything?<\/p>\n
There\u2019s \u200balso a moment that made me laugh out loud. JJ confronts \u2062a villainous henchman, played by Flula Borg as a cross between Colin Firth and Dolph Lundgren. He confesses that he went to JJ\u2019s home and spared his dog, but that the prized blue fish in the bowl \u2062beside\u2062 his bed now \u201csleeps with the fishes.\u201d JJ looks up, eyes like burning coals, and \u200csays, \u201cForgive me for what I\u2019m \u200dabout to do,\u201d and as he begins to smash and kick like a human Terminator, Kristen Schaal, as \u200dhis right-hand operative, does the \u200cbest\u2062 delivery of \u201cRelease the\u2063 Kraken!\u201d I\u2019ve\u200b ever heard. For\u2062 most\u2064 of the movie, though, Bautista plays JJ as a well-behaved \u200cpaternal Kraken. Going forward, he needs to find out how to cultivate \u2062his charisma without letting\u2063 it get too domesticated.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Experience the wild ride of ‘My Spy: The Eternal City’! From jetpack stunts to teenage drama, Dave Bautista and Chloe Coleman deliver action-packed fun. But can this sequel live up to its spy-thriller promise? Find out in this high-flying adventure!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":952,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-950","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-movie"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieetv.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/950","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieetv.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieetv.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieetv.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieetv.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=950"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/movieetv.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/950\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieetv.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/952"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieetv.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=950"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieetv.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=950"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieetv.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=950"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}