Some performers have a tendency to want to dominate whatever production they’re in. A good director knows that actors such as this need to be kept in check, lest the spotlight constantly falls on them at the expense of the rest of the cast and the story. Based on her misguided comedy, The Spy Who Dumped Me, this is a lesson Susanna Fogel has yet to learn. Lacking originality or wit, the ineptitude of this production is compounded by the presence of SNL’s Kate McKinnon, who’s allowed to run amok and rend the scenery at every turn. While some may like the comedienne’s style, the director’s willingness to allow her shameless mugging throughout comes off as a desperate attempt to save a lackluster script.
Contending with yet another birthday alone, Audrey (Mila Kunis) is also dealing with the fact that her boyfriend Drew (Justin Theroux) has just broken up with her, via text no less. Turns out he has a rather good reason for doing so as he’s a secret agent on the run who’s gotten mixed up in some spy shenanigans and is forced to cut ties with everyone he knows. Audrey and her roommate Morgan (McKinnon) are unaware of his profession and just chalk Drew up as another jerk – that is, until the CIA come calling in the form of agents Sebastian (Sam Heughan) and Duffer (Hasan Minhaj), looking for information on Drew, followed by the girls' apartment being destroyed by an armed force looking for a missing thumb drive.
It doesn’t take long before our heroines are trying to track down the thumb drive and Drew themselves, jetting to Europe in a heartbeat due to some clues that have fallen into their laps. One noisy gunfight leads to a going-nowhere-fast car chase only to segue to another gunfight and then … you get the picture. All the beats from a standard action film are present; none of them done with any sense of style, while the plot follows a lockstep pattern as well with nary a surprise in sight.
As you would expect, whenever Audrey and Morgan wind up in a tense situation Kunis plays it straight and McKinnon is allowed to turn her shtick up to 11, talking a mile a minute, casting manic wild-eyed looks about and delivering “clever” asides with the subtlety of a sledgehammer. She is “distraction” personified, and, as a result, whenever she’s onscreen all the viewer can do is look at her, pulling us out of the story time and time again.
With the quality of the writing on hand, this isn’t hard to do, as the script is composed of well-worn narrative tricks and not a single funny line. I didn’t laugh once. However, giving credit where it’s due, Heughan (Outlander) accords himself well, commanding the screen whenever he appears and showing such a flair for action scenes that I’d be eager to see him in a serious thriller. However, his fine work can’t outweigh the ineptitude on display in Spy, a staggering embarrassment.
For a review of Three Identical Strangers, go to the Cinemascoping blog at http://illinostimes.com.
Contact Chuck Koplinski at [email protected].
