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Spy Kids, Spy Kids 2 – Great film, great opening of a camera moving along a beach and into the window of a house on the shore and into the bedroom of two young kids, Carmen and Gerti. Nice. Cool flashback scene as their mom, Ingrid, tells the story of two spies who are on enemy camps initially but eventually fall in love. Nice scene of their wedding being blasted to bits, then the two escaping in a speedboat, attack helicopters in pursuit, as they go off on their honeymoon. Of course it’s no fairy tale, but it’s “How I Met Your Mother”, only the kids don’t know that it’s not a fairy tale… yet. Wonderful setup for the film, flawless. Eventually things come crashing down, real life enters the kids’ world, and off they go to save their parents, bumbling all the way. Actor Daryl Sabara, who plays Juni, was only nine years old at the time. He’s charming and innocent, but believable somehow; interesting gag about one of them still being in diapers… until we find out that it isn’t Juni. The two kids have nice sibling rivalry, they have real emotional issues (Juni is bullied, has no friends, Carmen plays hooky all the time and goes off to… Belize?).
Robert Patrick is great in the movie as Mr Lisp, an evil billionaire funding a secret project to create android decoys (he’s a tough guy, but otherwise doesn’t give in to the temptation to reprise his role as T-1000 from Terminator 2), Tony Shaloub is good as Minion (he is a minion), George Clooney suave as a secret service director, and Teri Hatcher plays a certain treacherous Ms Gradenko (remember the Police song from Synchronicity?). And yes, Danny Trejo is in the movie as Isador “Machete” Cortez, their real uncle (Cheech Marin plays their fake uncle – a joke that gets recycled a bit in the sequel).
Very nice little film – too bad the sequel lacks its smarts, character development and charm (and interesting cameos).
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Spy Kids 2: The Island Of Lost Dreams – Hardly as good as the original, nor with any of the interesting cameos of the original, this film has a half-hearted Steve Buscemi playing an evil scientist, a role nearly as irritatingly underwhelming as his appearance in another big budget sequel, Escape From LA (at least fellow Coen Brothers alumni John Torturro put some oomph into his role as Simmons in the otherwise-awful Transformers films). There’s also Latin screen legend Ricardo Montalbalm as Jini and Carmen’s grandfather.
The plot revolves around Juni and Carmen going on their own first mission, to locate a hidden island that’s full of strange mutated creatures. Their parents and grandparents, bickering the whole time like children themselves, go out to rescue them. It’s all very silly, including rival Spy Kids Garry and Gerty Giggles, children of traitorous OSS chief Donnagon Giggles (wasn’t he in the first movie? He was, and he’s played by… Mike Judge, creator of Beavis and Butthead, and King Of The Hill). Danny Trujo and Cheech Marin have small roles, it’s good to see them indeed. It really feels like a Robert Rodriguez movie. The movie is packed with really cheap-looking CG, almost unbearable. Apparently, Rodriguez turned down the studio’s offer for more money to get more expensive effects, going for wacky and creative, not smooth-looking. So that’s why the film looks so cheap. The only thing that looks good is the skeleton battle… an homage to the 1963 film Jason And The Argonauts (and in a sincere/opportunistic tribute to the innovative film, Rodriguez’ jerky and fake-looking battling skeletons make it look like technology hasn’t advanced a step since 1963).
But some of the lines are good, like when Donnagan talks to the President: “Thank you, Mr President, that will be all.” Or when Gerti says “I’m looking forward to retirement” (he’s ten years old). “Skeletons… dead skeletons.”
We’re kids, not monsters.
What’s the difference?