I Spy (film)

Infobox Film
name = I Spy

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caption = Promotional movie poster for "I Spy".
director = Betty Thomas
producer = Warren Carr
writer = Marianne Wibberley | Cormac Wibberley | Jay Scherick | David Ronn | based upon characters created by Sheldon Leonard, Morton Fine, David Friedkin starring = Eddie Murphy
Owen Wilson
Famke Janssen
Malcolm McDowell
distributor = Sony Pictures
released = November 1, 2002
runtime = 97 min.
language = English
budget = $70,000,000
amg_id = 1:267271
imdb_id = 0297181

"I Spy" is a 2002 American spy comedy film starring Eddie Murphy and Owen Wilson. The film was based upon the television series of the same name that aired in the 1960s which starred Robert Culp and Bill Cosby.

Plot summary

Special agent Alex Scott (Owen Wilson) and middleweight world champion Kelly Robinson (Eddie Murphy) are reluctantly paired for a dangerous mission to recover the Switchblade, the U.S.A's latest and most technologically sophisticated reconnaissance aircraft, which they cannot find because it employs a form of Active camouflage. The prototype spy plane has fallen into the hands of a nefarious arms dealer, Arnold Gundars (Malcolm McDowell) , who plans to sell it to the highest bidder: a rogue terrorist with access to nuclear warheads. After the U.S. government fails to retrieve the plane through the normal undercover channels, the president asks Robinson to provide civilian cover for agent Scott to find the stealth aircraft before the terrorist transforms it into a delivery system for weapons of mass destruction. Scott needs Robinson to penetrate Gundar's palatial headquarters in Budapest. An avid boxing fan, Gundars is staging a championship bout between the undefeated Robinson (57-0) and the reigning European titleholder. The real contest takes place outside the ring, however, between the cocky Robinson and the put-upon Scott. Playing prank after prank on each other, they arrive in Budapest, where Scott has Robinson kidnapped to test his courage. Though Robinson fails the test, Scott lies, telling him he's the "why not?" guy. Robinson successfully gets Scott into the palace, where Scott almost gets the needed data, but is foiled by Robinson walking in and setting off the alarms. However, the attempted breach wasn't in vain, for they switched Gundar's pen with a GPS tracker. After a series of near disasters, the two men finally bond in the depths of the Budapest sewer system. Robinson, a womanizer, coaches the shy, insecure Scott in the art of seduction so he can woo Rachel, the beautiful agent who is on assignment with them. In turn, Scott introduces Robinson to the dazzling world of espionage and high-tech spy gadgetry. Robinson uses Scott's eye camera and speaker to see everything Alex sees, and tells Alex how to win Rachael, which he finally does, only to have it ruined by Gundar's pen moving. They follow him into a trap that leads Scott and Robinson into an intense firefight, and kills Rachael in a car explosion. - - Scott blames Robinson for Rachael's death, because Robinson led the two into the firefight. They then fight each other, inflicting painful hits and kicks on one another until the Hungarian police show up and arrest Robinson (Scott spoke Hungarian and said Robinson was mugging him). Scott later tracks down Gundars and follows him to a bridge, where he sees the almost-invisible outline of the switchblade on one of the towers on the major bridge. Meanwhile, Robinson gets out of jail, and goes to the championship fight. Alex attempts to arrest Gundars, his men, and his buyer; but is stopped by Rachael, who turns out to be bad. As Kelly fights in the ring, Rachael tortures Alex for the switchblades's codes (the aircraft was supposed to be flown back to the U.S. by Alex) by slamming him around and sticking him with a knife. Alex turns the eye camera back on so Kelly sees the predicament and hears Alex say their on the bridge. Kelly knocks out his opponent, and races to the bridge where he saves Alex, and together they battle Gundars's men, killing Gundars in the process. Superspy Carlos shows up, and shoots the remaining men. Robinson takes an immediate dislike to Carlos, and punches him after Carlos tells him to "go back to your perfume commercials." Rachael manages to convince Scott that she's really on their side, using a ridiculous excuse that only Scott would believe. Carlos regains consciousness, and begins attacking Scott, and Rachael escapes with Gundars's laptop, which has the codes to wired accounts for billions. Kelly and Scott decide they still saved the day by recovering the plane, and as they fly off in it, the gas leaks out from a bullet hole, and they inadvertently crash it into the Danube River. However, though they lost the plane, they recovered a nuclear bomb that was destined to hit Washington D.C. Later, they catch Rachael, where Alex finally loses his infatuation for her, and she tells them to look at the papers.They look to see Carlos, next to President Bush, get the credit for stopping the bomb. As Kelly angrily leaves, Alex convinces him to come with him to be debriefed, saying they were going to try the "hover-gel", a gelatinous substance that allows people to slowly float down to the ground in an oxygen rich environment. As they walk out, Alex tells one of the BNS agents to get two parachutes on a plane, and a couple jars of jelly.

Cast

*Owen Wilson as Special Agent Alex Scott
*Eddie Murphy as Kelly Robinson
*Famke Janssen as Special Agent Rachel Wright
*Malcolm McDowell as Arnold Gundars
*Gary Cole as Carlos
*Phill Lewis as Jerry

Characters

* Special Agent Alex Scott (Owen Wilson)

Young and prone to ruining a mission, Special Agent Scott just cannot catch a break. Helplessly in love with Special Agent Rachel Wright, and jealous of Super-Agent Carlos's success and popularity, Alex Scott must get the arrogant and cocky Kelly Robinson to cooperate and help BNS (fictional government variant of the CIA) stop Gundars and get the Switchblade stealth jet back. Alex tries to be a good spy, and wants to impress other agents, but just screws up the operations. Alex is very jealous of Carlos, because Carlos gets tiny, "sexy" gadgets while Alex gets a micro-camera the approximate size of a rocket launcher, and a micro-recorder the size of a deep-cycle boat battery. Alex Scott is the opposite of Robinson when it comes to women, and is instead shy, insecure, and uncommited to flirting with them, especially Rachel. Alex is determined to be as good as Carlos, and believes one of the reasons everyone thinks Carlos is a better spy is because Carlos's bombs "are more potent than mine." Alex initially tries to win over Kelly with the gadgets he stole from Carlos's box, but later bonds with Robinson after testing him in an interrogation scenario where Kelly tells the interrogators (made up of BNS agents and Rachel) everything except Alex's name (mainly because he doesn't know it, saying "it a white name like Alan or Albert"). They later bond more in the sewers under Budapest while hiding from Gundar's men, by telling the other about themselves.

* Middle-Weight World Champion Kelly J. Robinson (Eddie Murphy)

A very cocky, cool, womanizing, not-too-bright, and extremely confident champion boxer, Robinson has a very impressive record of 57 wins and 0 losses (which he proudly boast throughout the movie as "I'm Kelly Robinson, baby, 57 and 0."). After winning his 57th fight, Kelly decides to fight Europe's champion boxer in Budapest, Hungary. The U.S. calls Kelly (via G.W. Bush's voice) and asks Kelly to provide civilian cover for a BNS spy (Scott).Despite his boxing record, tons of money, and women, Alex Scott finds Kelly Robinson to be extremely annoying because of his constant boasting and always referring to himself in the third person. Scott and Robinson get off to a bad start by video-phone, which gets worse later in the airport. Kelly, disliking Alex and needed an excuse to bring him, tells his staff (made up of his friends) that Alex is the mentally challenged relative of G.W. Bush (prompting them to call him "Rain-man," from the Movie Rain Man starring Tom Cruise and Dustin Hoffman). In retaliation, Scott speaks Hungarian to the Budapest hotel, and tells them to put Kelly in the cheapest room they have (the basement). However, after Alex "tests" Kelly by having him abducted and interrogated, and later lies to Kelly about his performance (Kelly almost confessed everything), they begin to like each other, especially after an extreme car-chase and admitting things to each other while hiding in a sewer.

* Special Agent Rachel Wright (Famke Janssen)

Mistress of seduction, Rachel is the love interest of Alex, and is known to have had sexual relations with the super-spy Carlos (which makes Alex all the more jealous). In a twist, Rachel (after being presumbably blown up) turns out to be bad, and tortures Alex for the codes to the switchblade jet with a knife. Later, when Kelly comes to Alex's aid and catches her, Rachel pretends to be a double agent against Gundars, stating that BNS was suspicious of Carlos, and using Alex's interest in her and his jealously of Carlos to win him over. Alex, blind from love, accepts her half-baked story, and unintentionally allows her to escape with Gundars's laptop with billions of dollars in it. Later, after Alex and Kelly catch her, she has the last laugh by showing them the newspapers, which say Carlos saved the day.

*Arnold Gundars (Malcolm McDowell)

An evil arms dealer, Gundars just got his hands on the world's stealthiest, covert jet; the switchblade. Now, for a few billion dollars, he's willing to sell the plane to the highest bidder. Scott, Wright, and Robinson must track Gundars to the plane, so Alex can fly it back to the U.S. Fortunately, Gundars loves boxing, and is holding a boxing party to cover his secret plane bidding, thus allowing Scott and way in.

* Super-Agent Carlos (Gary Cole)

The ultimate "James Bond" class spy, Carlos is idolized by many for being such a great spy. Carlos is the bane of Scott's existence, because Carlos succeeds when Scott fails, and Carlos always gets the better gadgets and vehicles. Although he acts like he's from South America, Carlos is instead from Iowa (a fact Scott points out). At the end of the movie, Carlos is sent to Budapest to stop Alex from screwing up the whole operation, but ends up confusing the whole event.

Trivia

* This is the first Hollywood movie where Budapest "stars" as Budapest and a great part of the plot takes place there. (Budapest's previous screen appearances include the part of Buenos Aires in "Evita" (1996); Berlin in "Spy Game" (2001); and as London, Rome, and Berlin again in "Munich" (2005).)
* Malcolm McDowell's character's palace is actually the Hungarian Royal Palace, sometimes called Buda Castle, which had been home to generations of Hungarian royalty for centuries.
* When making a reservation at the Hotel Gellert, Owen Wilson's character supposedly speaks in Hungarian; however, his pronunciation is so poor that few if any Hungarians would understand what he is saying.
* Major Hungarian stars are in the film as extras. (Security guards etc.)

External links

*imdb title|id=0297181|title=I Spy