Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me

Film is too crude, mean-spirited; spy shtick is tiresome

To fans of the original "Austin Powers" film, the spy genre parody was at least as funny as it was crude. To its detractors, the movie was at least as crude as it was funny.

Neither of those statements can really be said about its rather obligatory follow-up, "Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me," a joke-a-minute comedy that is at least as mean-spirited as it is anything else.

Just to get an idea of the film's idea of wit, it features a variety of jokes at the expense of obese people, short people and even unattractive people. The end result is more cringe-inducing than it is knee-slapping.

And if anything, "The Spy Who Shagged Me" is cruder than its predecessor, with even more jokes about bodily functions, sexual innuendo and other bits that make you wonder how it ever got a PG-13 rating.

The prequel-within-a-sequel picks up where the first film left off, namely the honeymoon of swinging superspy Austin Powers (Myers) and fellow agent Vanessa Kensington (Elizabeth Hurley). But happiness manages to elude Austin again, as his new bride turns out to be a killer robot, sent by Dr. Evil (also played by Myers).

Austin survives the assassination attempt but soon must thwart another scheme by his longtime nemesis. Aided by his new henchmen, a grotesquely overweight Scotsman (Myers yet again) and a diminutive clone named Mini-Me (Verne Troyer), Dr. Evil goes back in time to steal Austin's "mojo," the secret of his considerable appeal to women.

The would-be world dictator is also threatening to destroy Washington, D.C., a move that forces Austin to head back to the Swinging '60s, where he teams up with an American agent, Felicity Shagwell (Heather Graham), also on Dr. Evil's trail.

Admittedly, this isn't exactly a cerebral premise, but Myers and co-scripter Michael McCullers stoop to new lows, scrounging up stale old gags and even more distasteful jokes, few of which really work.

And for a film that's less than 100 minutes, the material feels ridiculously padded. The story itself is incredibly disjointed — as if another hour's worth of material was left on the cutting room floor. (Of course, given that so many of the jokes fall flat this time, maybe that's not really such a bad thing.)

Myers the performer is similarly inconsistent. He seems to be sleepwalking through his role as the title character, whose shtick gets tiresome. As Dr. Evil, however, he's extremely funny — though he's not able to salvage this mess.

As for the supporting performances, Rob Lowe does a very funny Robert Wagner impression (he plays a younger version of Wagner's character). But Graham is surprisingly wooden, and Seth Green, playing Dr. Evil's smart-mouthed son, isn't given nearly enough to do.

"Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me" is rated PG-13 for vulgar sexual and scatological sight gags and puns, slapstick- styled fisticuffs, gunplay and adventure violence, copious female partial nudity and brief male nudity, scattered profanities and a brief sex scene (overheard).