I SPY is yet another embarrassing example of the current flood of "comedy spy" films to come out of Hollywood.   To hear Hollywood tell it, any Joe Doakes off the street can apparently be pulled out of the population and become an overnight James Bond, the only prerequisite is that he is a comedian.  
        Eddie Murphy fans keep on going back to see "just one more" of his movies because they remember an Eddie that could entertain.  Alas, his last few outings have been celluloid melt-downs.  While impossible to be worse than Pluto Nash,   I SPY is its equal.   Eddie Murphy apparently thinks he is as super-great as the characters he plays and can ad-lib all his lines.  Then again, it may be that there was never a script in the first place - one can't be sure.  
       Likewise, co-star Owen Wilson seems to stride from weakness to weakness.   If Wilson's agent isn't just milking the cow 'till it drops, he will mercifully tell the poor guy that the cine-world is tired of castrated 'Ninety's Guys', and that, like carbon paper, every time he does an exact repeat of his previous performance, each copy gets harder to see.   Also, a many of us are starting to wonder why each of Wilson's films gets noticeably heavier into the "buddy film" theme - some would say Wilson shouting at Eddie, "You love me, you love me," was a tad over the top...
        If you're into cartoon-esque Laurel & Hardy balloon-rides, slapstick car-chases, frustrated sex, testicle humor and pathological 'male-bonding' scenes, you may be a candidate to make it all the way to the end of the film and tell the rest of us how it ended.   But remember, I didn't promise -- I said, 'you MAY be' able to make it all the way to the credits. I had to leave halfway through, popcorn uneaten, as I remembered I had to go brush my teeth.  
        Perhaps the only redeeming item in this film is the fresh face of Famke Janssen, who plays Rachel, a CIA (?) agent with questionable allegiances.
       Enduring Line or Phrase:  "We don't have no pedestal, all we got is a cot in the back."

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