| Spies Like Us | |
|---|---|
 Theatrical release poster byJohn Alvin | |
| Directed by | John Landis |
| Screenplay by | |
| Story by |
|
| Produced by | |
| Starring | |
| Cinematography | Robert Paynter |
| Edited by | Malcolm Campbell |
| Music by | Elmer Bernstein |
Production companies |
|
| Distributed by | |
Release dates |
|
Running time | 109 minutes[1] |
| Country | United States[1] |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $22 million[2] |
| Box office | $77.3 million[3] |
Spies Like Us is a 1985 Americanspycomedy film directed byJohn Landis, and starringChevy Chase,Dan Aykroyd,Steve Forrest, andDonna Dixon. The film presents the comic adventures of two novice intelligence agents sent to theSoviet Union. Originally written by Aykroyd andDave Thomas to star Aykroyd andJohn Belushi atUniversal, the script went intoturnaround following Belushi's 1982 death and was later picked up byWarner Bros., starring Aykroyd and Chase.
Partly filmed on location nearSognefjord in Norway (as Russia) and the Sahara (as Pakistan),[4][5][6] the film is ahomage to the famousBob Hope andBing CrosbyRoad to... film series. Hope himself cameos in one scene. Other cameos include directorsTerry Gilliam,Sam Raimi,Costa-Gavras,Martin Brest,Frank Oz, andJoel Coen, musicianB. B. King, and visual effects pioneerRay Harryhausen. Although contemporary reviews of the film were mixed,Spies Like Us was a financial success, grossing $77 million.
Austin Millbarge is a code breaker dwelling in the dark basement atthe Pentagon who aspires to escape his under-respected job to become a secret agent. Emmett Fitz-Hume, a wisecracking, pencil-pushing son of an envoy, takes the foreign service exam under peer pressure. Millbarge and Fitz-Hume meet during the test, on which Fitz-Hume openly cheats after his attempts to bribe his female supervisor and the test monitor in exchange for the answers both fail. Millbarge was not prepared to take the test, having had only one night to study after his supervisor deliberately withheld a two-weeks notice for the exam, leaving him vulnerable to fail and having to remain in the bowels of the Pentagon.
Needing two expendable covert agents to act as decoys to draw attention away from a more capable team, Ruby and Keyes of theDefense Intelligence Agency (DIA) decide to enlist Fitz-Hume and Millbarge, promote them to GLG-20 Foreign Service Operatives, rush them through minimal military survival training, and then send them on an undefined mission insidePakistan andSoviet Central Asia. Meanwhile, the two professional agents are well on their way to carry out the actual objective: the seizure of a mobile SS-50ICBM launcher in Soviet territory. A member of the main team is killed, while Millbarge and Fitz-Hume manage to escape multiple enemy attacks and eventually encounter Karen Boyer, the surviving operative from the main team.
In thePamir Mountains of theTajik Soviet Socialist Republic, the trio disguises themselves in hastily constructed extraterrestrial outfits and tranquilizes the mobile missile guard unit. Following orders in real-time from the intelligence agency (operating from the W.A.M.P. military bunker located deep under an abandoneddrive-in theater in Nevada), they begin to operate the launcher. At the end of their instructions, the vehicle launches theICBM into space, targeting an unspecified area in the Continental United States. Thinking they have started a nuclear war, the American agents and their Soviet counterparts pair up to have sex before the world is destroyed.
Meanwhile, Ruby and Keyes have joined Generals Sline and Miegs, the two military commanders at W.A.M.P., in the operations bunker. They initiate the conversion of the drive-in theater to expose what is hidden beneath the screens and projection booth: a hugeblack-opSDI-esque laser and collector/emitter screen. The purpose of sending the agents to launch a Soviet ICBM is exposed as a means to test thisanti-ballistic missile system, but the laser malfunctions and fails to intercept the missile. Despite this, Sline and Miegs choose not to inform the President and the US Government that the missile launch was not a nuclear attack initiated by the Soviet Union, revealing to the horrified Ruby and Keyes, a twisted contingency plan of letting the impending thermonuclear war commence to "preserve the American way of life".
Back in the Soviet Union, horrified at the thought of having launched a nuclear missile at their own country, Milbarge realizes that the missile can be diverted. The American spies and Soviet technicians quickly use Millbarge's knowledge ofmissile guidance systems to transmit instructions that deflect the missile off into space where it harmlessly detonates. Immediately after, the underground W.A.M.P. bunker is located and stormed byU.S. Army Rangers, Ruby, Keyes and the rogue military officials involved in the unauthorized covert operation are all arrested. Millbarge, Fitz-Hume, and Boyer go on to becomenuclear disarmament negotiators, playing a nuclear version ofRisk-meets-Trivial Pursuit against their new Soviet friends.
Other actors making appearances in minor roles includeJeff Harding as Fitz-Hume's state department colleague andHeidi Sorenson as Alice, Fitz-Hume's supervisor. Also making cameo appearances are special effects designerDerek Meddings as Dr. Stinson, directorsJoel Coen,Sam Raimi, andMartin Brest as the drive-in security, comedianBob Hope as himself, musicianB. B. King and directorsMichael Apted andLarry Cohen as the Ace Tomato agents, and NBC newscasterEdwin Newman as himself.
The title song, "Spies Like Us", was written and performed byPaul McCartney. The recording peaked at #7 on the singles chart in the United States in early 1986; The song was McCartney's last to reach the top ten in the US until 2015.[7] It also reached #13 in the UK.[8] John Landis directed a music video for the song where Aykroyd and Chase are seen in a recording studio, performing the song with McCartney (although they didn't actually play on the record).[citation needed]
Landis has stated that he feels "Spies Like Us" is "a terrible song" but he couldn't say no to McCartney and Warner Bros.[9]
The film's score was composed byElmer Bernstein and performed by theGraunke Symphony Orchestra, conducted by the composer. The soundtrack album was released byVarèse Sarabande; it does not contain thePaul McCartney song. The film also features "Soul Finger" by theBar-Kays, also absent from the soundtrack. In an early scene, Fitz-Hume watchesRonald Reagan,Virginia Mayo andGene Nelson sing "I'll Still be Loving You" in the 1952 film musicalShe's Working Her Way Through College.[citation needed]
The film had its world premiere on December 3, 1985, for theVariety Club of Southern California and theWill Rogers Institute.[10]
Spies Like Us grossed $8.6 million on its US opening weekend and ultimately grossed $60 million in the United States and Canada[3] against a budget of $22 million.[2][11] The film grossed $17.2 million overseas[12] for a worldwide total of $77.3 million.[3]
TheWashington Post criticPaul Attanasio calledSpies Like Us "a comedy with exactly one laugh, and those among you given to Easter egg hunts may feel free to try and find it".[13] TheChicago Reader criticDave Kehr criticized the character development, saying that "Landis never bothers to account for the friendship that springs up spontaneously between these two antipathetic types, but then he never bothers to account for anything in this loose progression of recycledAbbott and Costello riffs".[14]The New York Times criticJanet Maslin wrote: "The stars are always affable, and they're worth watching even when they do very little, but it's painful to sit by as the screenplay runs out of steam."[15]
Variety magazine opined in a staff review: "Spies is not very amusing. Though Chase and Aykroyd provide moments, the overall script thinly takes on eccentric espionage and nuclear madness, with nothing new to add."[16]TV Guide published a staff review, stating: "Landis' direction is indulgent, to say the least, with big landscapes, big crashes, big hardware, and big gags filling the screen. What he forgets is character development, that all-important factor that must exist for comedy to work well."[17] David Parkinson, writing for theRadio Times, felt that "Dan Aykroyd and Chevy Chase simply fail to gel, and there's little fun to be had once the boisterous training school gags are exhausted."[18]
Review aggregation websiteRotten Tomatoes shows a score of 35% based on 26 reviews and an average rating of 4.5/10. The site's consensus states: "Despite the comedic prowess of its director and two leads,Spies Like Us appears to disavow all knowledge of how to make the viewer laugh."[19]Metacritic displays a score of 22 out of 100, based on 9 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews".[20] Writing forCommon Sense Media, Andrea Beach called the film a "dated '80s comedy [with] strong language, few laughs".[21]Collider staff writer Jeff Giles, reviewing the film'sBlu-ray release, stated: "on the whole, it’s more amusing than funny; it’s only 102 minutes, but it feels too long by half. For all the talent involved, there’s an awful lot of flab. It’s the kind of movie you can walk away from for 10 minutes without missing anything important."[22]
A plot point in the film is that funding for the covert operation came from deceiving Congress, who "thinks the funds are for more stealth bombers".[23] On November 22, 1988, three years after the film's release, the firststealth bomber would actually be unveiled to the public.[24]
Animated sitcomFamily Guy paid tribute to the film with its 2009 episode "Spies Reminiscent of Us", which guest starred Aykroyd and Chase as fictionalized versions of themselves who, according to the series, were made real spies byRonald Reagan after he saw the film. The episode recreates numerous scenes.[25][26]
In 2013, the film was remembered for its depiction of theAfghan mujahideen.[27][28] In the film, Aykroyd's character, surrounded by potentially-hostile armed locals, reassures his partner by explaining: "These are theYusufzai. They're Afghani freedom fighters! They're our allies!" Turning to the locals, his partner (played by Chevy Chase) happily proclaims to the assembled soldiers "We're Americans!!!"—only for the film to cut to a shot of the two American spies hanging upside down, about to be executed.[27][29][30]
Favourite film location? We shot some of Spies Like Us in Norway, on the top of a mountain near Sognefjord.
