Review of "I-Spy," DVD version

Review of

I-Spy, DVD version

Four out of five stars

 The problem with this movie is that it is too manic, the two main characters often seem to be engaged in a fast-talking contest when they speak their lines. Eddie Murphy plays a champion boxer that is undefeated in 70 bouts and Owen Wilson a U. S. superspy that is a bit of a failure. An extremely secret new plane has been taken by a man in Budapest, Hungary and that is where the plane is hidden. The thief plans on auctioning the plane to the highest international bidder and since another championship bout is scheduled for Budapest, the Murphy and Wilson characters are teamed up to recapture the plane.

 In a completely predictable sequence of events, the two men start out at odds, but then grow to like each other and become teammates. A night of being locked in a sewer together would tend to do that. With some questionable aid from others, the two men take on the bad guys, keep themselves from getting killed and recover the plane. However, not without a great deal of action that is reminiscent of “The Three Stooges.”

 As mentioned earlier, the movie has a lot of fast action, the problem is that much of it is verbal. When the two main characters are together, they talk very fast and not always sensibly. It is only when others are involved in the scenes do they slow it down. The director of this movie needed to learn from the best James Bond movies, where his nonchalance in the face of danger was what made the scene so dramatic.