Written as part of the weekly blogathon hosted by Wandering Through the Shelves. Participate yourself by picking three movies that fit the week's theme and telling us about them.
This week's theme for Thursday Movie Picks correlates to the weekend's big release, the new James Bond film SPECTRE. Can I let you in on a secret? Up until Skyfall, I had never seen a Bond film. Not a single one. I'm not really sure why. I've just never been able to muster up the excitement for them.
But anyway, that's not really the point. The point is, there's much more to Secret Agents and Spies on film than Bond and his dirty martinis. Here are three of my favorites.
North By Northwest (Alfred Hitchcock, 1959) Probably the most exciting film Hitchcock ever directed, in which Cary Grant is mistaken for a Mr. George Kaplan, a spy who, as it turns out, doesn't exist. Which is especially unfortunate for Cary after he's photographed taking a knife out of a U.N. diplomat's back. Someone else put it there, but try telling that to the police, especially when the secret government agency who created the persona of Kaplan won't get involved at the risk of exposing their real double agent, played by the gorgeous Eva Marie Saint. With James Mason as the big baddie and Martin Landau as his underling.
Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery (Jay Roach, 1997) Hands down the best thing Mike Myers has ever done, Austin Powers is a dead-on hilarious parody of the 60s and spy films. But you don't have to be particularly well-versed in spy films to enjoy it. It's pure silliness, but it's absolutely INSPIRED silliness. The jokes fly fast and furious from the lips of the inimitable cast (Elizabeth Hurley, Robert Wagner, and Mindy Sterling have never been better, to say nothing of Myers in his dual role as the titular spy and his arch-nemesis Dr. Evil), and the double entendres are the best I've seen in probably any movie ever. The later sequels, The Spy Who Shagged Me and Goldmember, are basically bald rewrites of this one, but why mess with perfection?
Mission: Impossible (Brian De Palma, 1996) One of the rare franchises that has kept up a pretty much even level of quality across each film, the Tom Cruise series is one of the best in film history. This is the one that started it all, and god DAMN is it fun. When Ethan Hunt's entire Impossible Missions Force (IMF) team gets killed, the agency assumes he's the mole they've been trying to find for a while. Except he's innocent, so he has to go rogue in order to prove his innocence. Cruise's "I do my own stunts" go-for-broke star power has never been put to better use than with this character, so it's no surprise that he keeps coming back to it. And given the great directors and scriptwriters that keep coming to the series, it's clear that someone behind the scenes knows what they're doing (for what it's worth, my pick for the best of the series is the fourth, Ghost Protocol). De Palma's original lays all the groundwork with flawless sequence after flawless sequence and a roller coaster pace that only lets up in just the right amounts to relieve the (at times considerable) tension.
BONUS PICK
The Man From U.N.C.L.E. (Guy Ritchie, 2014) It's a pity so many people dismissed this film this summer, because it was really a blast. The cool retro vibe extended from the perfect costumes and hairdos of its (unbelievably good-looking) stars to Ritchie's filmmaking, which has never been slicker or sleeker. It's ultimately a lark, but it's a great looking one, and lots of fun. Plus, between Henry Cavill, Armie Hammer, Alicia Vikander, and Elizabeth Debicki, there really is something here for everyone.
