The essence of "Spies like us" is best captured in the scene where candidates take the exam for secret service. The two dead-beats, Chase's and Aykroyd's characters, approach it completely unprepared, save for the cheat-sheets and attitude. Their charade is painfully obvious to the exam supervisor, they know it's obvious yet carry on with it to the bitter end. When I saw this flick again, 30 years after I loved it as a kid, I felt like that supervisor: "Are they for real? Do they really think they can get away with it?". He wasn't impressed with their attempt at passing the exam, I wasn't impressed with their lazy attempt at comedy.
Indeed, the key people involved don't appear they're even trying. There were four screenwriters in this and they still managed to underwrite the script. There are too few jokes, and many of them are just too dumb. Not funny, dumb. Like that whole training sequence, for instance. As if they put in all they had, and it was barely enough so they couldn't afford to throw the rubbish out.
Then there are stars of the flick. Chevy Chase goes with his usual devil-may-care routine which is okay when script leaves him something to subvert. When he has nothing to do, he is unfunny. He is just squirming there, like a dog that waits to be taken out for a walk. On the other hand, Dan Aykroyd, who co-wrote the screenplay, acts all too smugly, winking at the audience that he's in on all the jokes. His delivery in the "doctor... doctor... doctor..." scene is a perfect example of ruining a gag you're supposed to deliver in a sincere, deadpan fashion. But Aykroyd doesn't want to be perceived as dumb by the audience. That's his problem in other films, too.
John Landis topped them all by putting so little effort in the directing, I wonder if he was there at all. In that period his mind was probably more on trying to get cleared of that triple manslaughter charge than on putting together a funny film. Either that or he was too full of himself to care. After all he had so many hits under his belt already, "Trading Places" included. Nothing of his talent is visible here. Pedestrian camera angles, shots that could use a lot of trimming and giving too much freedom to principal cast. Many times I felt I was watching outtakes, when camera was left just rolling and nobody yelled "cut". Hell, almost every scene with Chase and Aykroyd looked like an outtake. The film plods most of the running time, picking up tempo only towards the end somewhat.
All in all, too bad, because the rest of the cast have done their job and the premise had potential. The idea of two wannabe spies sent to USSR to serve as a decoy for two real spies on an important Cold War mission, where the wannabes end up saving the day instead of the pros, works both as a spoof of the genre and as a pure slapstick comedy. Ironically, you'll find more laughs and slapstick in the films they spoofed.
Indeed, the key people involved don't appear they're even trying. There were four screenwriters in this and they still managed to underwrite the script. There are too few jokes, and many of them are just too dumb. Not funny, dumb. Like that whole training sequence, for instance. As if they put in all they had, and it was barely enough so they couldn't afford to throw the rubbish out.
Then there are stars of the flick. Chevy Chase goes with his usual devil-may-care routine which is okay when script leaves him something to subvert. When he has nothing to do, he is unfunny. He is just squirming there, like a dog that waits to be taken out for a walk. On the other hand, Dan Aykroyd, who co-wrote the screenplay, acts all too smugly, winking at the audience that he's in on all the jokes. His delivery in the "doctor... doctor... doctor..." scene is a perfect example of ruining a gag you're supposed to deliver in a sincere, deadpan fashion. But Aykroyd doesn't want to be perceived as dumb by the audience. That's his problem in other films, too.
John Landis topped them all by putting so little effort in the directing, I wonder if he was there at all. In that period his mind was probably more on trying to get cleared of that triple manslaughter charge than on putting together a funny film. Either that or he was too full of himself to care. After all he had so many hits under his belt already, "Trading Places" included. Nothing of his talent is visible here. Pedestrian camera angles, shots that could use a lot of trimming and giving too much freedom to principal cast. Many times I felt I was watching outtakes, when camera was left just rolling and nobody yelled "cut". Hell, almost every scene with Chase and Aykroyd looked like an outtake. The film plods most of the running time, picking up tempo only towards the end somewhat.
All in all, too bad, because the rest of the cast have done their job and the premise had potential. The idea of two wannabe spies sent to USSR to serve as a decoy for two real spies on an important Cold War mission, where the wannabes end up saving the day instead of the pros, works both as a spoof of the genre and as a pure slapstick comedy. Ironically, you'll find more laughs and slapstick in the films they spoofed.