#669 – Austin Powers: the Spy Who Shagged Me

Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me (1999)

Film review #669

Director: Jay Roach

SYNOPSIS: Dr. Evil returns from being frozen orbit with a new plan to defeat his nemesis Austin Powers: he travels to 1969 to steal Austin’s “mojo” and render him powerless. Austin chases him back in time, and teams up with CIA agent Felicity Shagwell to once again thwart Dr. Evil’s plan for world domination…

THOUGHTS/ANALYSIS: Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me is a 1999 film and a sequel to the 1997 Austin Powers film. Picking up right where the first film leaves off, Austin is on his honeymoon with Vanessa, when it turns out she is a fembot and tries to kill Austin. Destroying her and thus restoring his singlehood. Vanessa being a fembot all along makes zero sense in continuity, but like its predecessor, the film is a spoof that insists you don’t overthink about continuity and plotholes, and just “enjoy the ride.” This also goes for the time travel element of the story, as Basil and Austin turn to the camera, and tell the audience not to worry about it. That’s honestly the best way to do it in this type of film: you don’t want to get bogged down in the details and be thinking how it makes sense, rather than just enjoying the humour. Taking Austin back in time to 1969 puts Austin in his element, and refreshes the story instead of it being about Austin having to adjust to the 90’s again, which is a smart move and provides fertile ground for new material. In fact, I think this film actually flows better than the first one, which jumped around a bit too distinctly and made very little sense continuity-wise.

On the whole, the film is structured the same as the first one: With Michael Myers at the helm and following his experience on “Saturday Night Live,” the film is best treated as a series of related, somewhat connected skits. In this way, you can see that the skits are a bit of hit and miss: although the hits outweigh the misses by a good ratio, making an overall good experience. While the first film had the element of Vanessa being the prudish, straight-laced counter to Austin’s over-the-top colourful antics, this contrast never really got off the ground as a foundational plot-point, as Vanessa warmed up to Austin fairly quickly. Replacing Vanessa (Liz Hurley) with Felicity Shagwell (Heather Graham), who is just as high-energy as Austin is, allows the film to just revel in what it does best: being colourful and fun.

A noticeable change in this film is that the humour pivots to more crude comedy, and incorporating contemporary references. The first film was very much focused on spoofing spy films and obviously 007, and it was very thorough is getting through all the material to spoof. As such, it makes sense to pivot the humour slightly differently, as it somewhat exhausted it’s subject matter. With one of the opening scenes featuring Jerry Springer and his talk show, this obviously feels a bit dated, but you get the idea. The inclusion of the character Fat Bastard, also played by Myers alongside Austin and Doctor Evil, adds in more crude humour, which is not going to appeal to everyone. I think he’s a character which has one joke, which is recycled a bit too much. Nevertheless, he has become a rather iconic character, so you’re mileage will vary with that. The film also has callbacks to jokes from the previous film, but I think they fail to iterate on them or do anything different, so they feel like recycling the same material.

Overall, I think The Spy Who Shagged Me is more or less on the same level as International Man of Mystery. I think it slightly improves over the original in terms of flow and plot structure, and revels in it’s own identity a bit more than focusing on spoofing other films. Where it is weaker is perhaps the incorporation of contemporary references and the crude humour that don’t have the more timeless, universal appeal. On the whole though, the film carries the franchise onward well.