AUSTIN POWERS: International Man of Mystery

Finally, a movie that satirizes our collective nostalgia for the
sixties. Mike Myers gets the giddy deleria down pat as Austin 
Powers, a sly London "mod" photographer/super spy. He also plays 
the villain, Dr. Evil, a sort of composite of the Ernst Stavros 
Blofeld and Myer's old SNL foe, Lorne Michaels. After a catalcysmic
battle at a London nightclub, Dr. Evil escapes Power's clutches 
and cybergenetically freezes himself. Austin does the same, and 
soon they are both thawing out in the chill, no-fun nineties. It's 
an ingenious premise, and Myers has hung a variety of assorted 
gags around it, in addition of course, to the now required 
(thanks Jim Carrey) shitload of scatalogical humor.

Therein lies the only major problem with the picture. Compared 
to the non-stop zing of the NAKED GUN movies, Myer's own WAYNE'S 
WORLD, or even the real BOND series, AUSTIN POWERS sometimes 
meanders and drags, less a spy movie than a series of related 
skits ala SNL. But the skits are funny, Myers is always dead-on, 
and as Power's "Bond girl", Elizabth Hurley proves herself to be 
a very good comedic sport. The film may come off as being a bit
stretched out here and there, but you have to admire Mike 
Myer's off-the wall lunatic originality, as well as his subtle 
message to all the retro types out there who dress for a time 
they never knew. As Dr. Evil so succinctly puts it, "there's 
nothing more pathetic than an aging hipster."

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