Plot Details: This Review Reveals Minor Details About the Plot.
It ain't over till the fat lady swings.
Plot Overview
The camera comes in over the placid water, past some moored boats, to a highfalutin gathering, and as the suspense music builds we zero in on suave Bradley Fine (Jude Law) dressed in black bow tie. He slips past house security and descends the basement stairs, anticipating the opposition, for his audio feed from wide-bottomed, desk-bound analyst Susan Cooper (Melissa McCarthy) live at CIA ops. Coop (“I could never do what you do”) tells him, “You're the best.” Having regrettably killed East European arms dealer Tihomir Boyanov (Raad Rawi) before learning the whereabouts of the suitcase nuke hot on the market, and there being the tempting target of “next week's UN General Assembly,” Brad goes to find its location from Boyanov's haughty daughter Rayna Boyanov (Rose Byrne.) There it's lights-out for our agent, and Rayna feeds back through his mike, “I know who all your active agents are” and names a couple.
HQ is devastated. The MI6 liaison calls Rayna a “Twat!” Aggressive agent Rick Ford (Jason Statham) volunteers to submit to the putative face-off machine in order to remain undercover. Deputy Director Elaine Crocker (Allison Janney) reflects that, “We need someone invisible.” Cooper volunteers. As she's never been active, no-one knows her face. Ford says they don't need a “lunch lady.” Coop retorts that she's a certified agent. We infer that (fat) women don't advance as fast in the CIA as equally qualified men. Crocker having no other option relents (“It's a track and report mission only.”) Cooper is to go undercover to Paris as one “Carol Jenkins” a frumpy single mother of four, to be set up in a surveillance post across the street from their last lead. She's equipped with B-grade spy gadgets. She checks in to the fleabag Hôtel Mootiere. In the process of observing (“Regardez”), she spots something suspicious (“Je ne connais pas”), tails “the man from the picture,” runs interference for rogue Ford (“He's got a friend”), gives vigorous chase (“You're in pursuit”), and loses her quarry but recovers his camera.
Next, undercover as cat lady “Penny Morgan” she goes to Rome, Italy, where she's met at the Aeroporto by lecherous undercover driver Aldo (Peter Serafinowicz.) She changes attire and infiltrates Casino di Roma, mingles with the jet set (“Konichiwa”), and in a move reminiscent of James Bond in “Doctor No,” persuades vixen Rayna to take her on as her personal bodyguard. They travel by jet to Budapest, Hungary where she's “meeting a potential buyer.” Cooper is flying high (“I am so badass!”) Ford keeps interfering (“This fuckery stops now!”) After Rayna's regular bodyguards succumb to the action, “Penny” rounds out her protection detail with her CIA mousey colleague Nancy B. Artingstall (British actress Miranda Hart) and old lecherous Aldo (“You're in this country? Magnifico!”) As more players get involved this “track and report mission complete” veers still further off the rods. If you stay through the end credits of a James Bond film, you might see 007 get lucky. Cooper would get, what, a thumb drive?
Ideology
The girls at Langley are early on beset by bats from the rafters dropping down on them. After the bat infestation is managed, it's mice crawling all over them. And then the star becomes a “cat lady” presumably surrounded by cuddlies. Human companionship is equally intrusive. Nancy at one point climbs on top of rapper “50 Cent Piece” (to create a diversion), and in an escape maneuver, Aldo mounts our undercover mama. What is this, we've got to ask ourselves, Noah's Ark? If it is, then a black rapper is part of it, too, and what does that do for his image?
In trying to pick a “spy name”, Susan attempted the spy school formula of taking her pet's name for her first name, and the street name where she grew up as her last. That gives her: Meatball Martin Luther King Jr. Bv. This derives from a black American having once visited Germany and being impressed by church reformer Martin Luther, he changed his own name to MLK and named his kid after himself. Street names eventually followed. The progression is: Martin Luther → Martin Luther King → Martin Luther King Jr. → Martin Luther King Jr. Bv. → Meatball Martin Luther King Jr. Bv. A meatball is the same round shape and size as a 50 cent piece, the name of the black rapper appearing in this movie. Very strange considering that's the one coin that tends to get segregated from the rest in the drawer, and MLK was against segregation.
In Eugene, OR where I live, the renaming of our local Centennial Bv., a name given at Oregon's Centennial honoring the pioneers, to MLK Bv., one given on the recommendation of the Portland NAACP, was naturally opposed by some residents. Our "diversity expert" was so displeased by the controversy that she returned to California after issuing an imprecation: “God will judge you!”
Martin Luther King Jr. writing his Letter from Birmingham Jail to the clergy to justify his methods (marching w/o a parade permit) complained of lack of respect when Whites would refer to him as some Tom, Dick or Harry, not by his real name when they knew it, or should have. Only he used the general appellations: John, boy, or nigger. A johnny can refer to any man one doesn't know the name of. A boy is the term often used for males of any age or color in the south. And a nigger is a man of dark skin. In fact when the Bible lists some Tom, Dick, and Harrys as “prophets and teachers” (Acts 13:1), included is “Simeon that was called Niger.” Niger is the latin word for black, from which we derive nigger.
How come God is going to judge my town for wanting to retain control of its street names and he's not going to judge the NAACP for trying to impose on us from the outside the name of a man who didn't like to have names imposed on him from outside? This movie takes us back to Noah's ark to help us resolve it.
Let's look again at Noah's story (Jasher 5:14-17):
And the Lord said unto Noah, Take unto thee a wife, and beget children, for I have seen thee righteous before me in this generation. And thou shalt raise up seed, and thy children with thee, in the midst of the earth; and Noah went and took a wife, and he chose Naamah the daughter of Enoch, and she was five hundred and eighty years old. And Noah was four hundred and ninety-eight years old, when he took Naamah for a wife. And Naamah conceived and bare a son, and he called his name Japheth, saying, God has enlarged me in the earth; and she conceived again and bare a son, and he called his name Shem, saying, God has made me a remnant, to raise up seed in the midst of the earth.
Shem and Japheth were full brothers, Ham was born at a later date (the youngest, see Gen. 9:24) perhaps from a different mother. Noah's wife was older than he was. Perhaps at 580+ years she was no longer able to bear children after the first two. She didn't have any more after the flood, even though it was a time to repopulate the Earth. Maybe she stopped bearing before the flood. If Ham the youngest was the stepbrother of the other two, he would correspond in this movie to Aldo who is Albert from MI6. another intelligence service. Susan and Nancy are CIA "sisters" in this movie: “You look like someone's demented aunts on vacation.” These three repopulated the field agents who'd been swept out of service, as did the three sons of Noah repopulate the flooded Earth.
After the Flood there was an incident, Gen. 9:20-22, where Noah got drunk on wine and was exposed in all his glory to his son Ham who brazenly viewed him so. Noah's other two sons, Shem and Japheth, covered him up, Gen. 9:23. Ham had violated him in some way, Gen. 9:24. Noah's curse puts Ham's youngest son Canaan in a position of servitude, Gen. 9:25. Noah's other two sons Shem, Gen. 9:26, and Japheth, Gen. 9:27, were blessed by Noah. Writer Bodie Hodge (134) quotes “Bible Questions and Answers,” The Golden Age (July 24, 1929): p. 702.
Question: Is there anything in the Bible that reveals the origin of the Negro?
Answer: It is generally believed that the curse which Noah pronounced upon Canaan was the origin of the Black race. Certain it is that when Noah said, “Cursed be Canaan, a servant of servants shall he be to his brethren,” he pictured the future of the Colored race.
In “Spy” Susan having recovered a camera of the opposition, they scan through its images and encounter some graphically explicit photos of its owner's penis. Some of the girls ogle. Susan and Nancy avert their eyes. These two would represent respectful Shem and Japheth. Aldo whom they connect up with later represents Ham. He was regularly copping a feel and making suggestive comments (“There have been some complaints.”) Ham was of a different cut. Aldo was assigned the servile job of driving, in Italy where men have a rep for being lecherous. Thus in this context such a handsy guy would blend right in, be invisible. In Noah's day he had to deal with hereditary sin nature for the new world, and one son who was from another mother. In our PC age we have to deal with a presumed equality that can, unfortunately, lead to circular reasoning. In “Spy” a black gentleman seated at the next table to the principals in a restaurant scene looked dignified enough, and 50 Cent was a celebrity.
Production Values
“Spy” was a low key send-up of the spy genre. Its writer & director was Paul Feig. It stars Melissa McCarthy, Rose Byrne, and Jude Law. No-one turns in a bad performance in this exhilarating action comedy. The supporting actors are very strong, especially Byrne and Janney. Brawny action star Jason Statham delivers one awesome performance as an agent full of himself. Retired rapper 50 Cent is a better rapper than an actor, but he's been shot for real in his past.
MPAA rated this picture R for language throughout, violence, and some sexual content including brief graphic nudity. The language was raunchy at times but that wasn't the focus of the humor. The closing credits are shadowed by dossier type vignettes of Susan's exploits to come, as is a final after-credits outtake.
Review Conclusion w/ Christian Recommendation
As far as spoofs go, I find 'Spy' surprisingly well-plotted. It's an above-average comedy making wise use of its stars, settings and setup. Covert ops provides fertile ground for plot points, humor and, incidentally, some stunning scenery. It turned out to be a lot better than I'd expected. I only wish they could have toned down the language some, but it could have been worse.
Movie Ratings
Action factor: Well done action flick. Suitability For Children: Not Suitable for Children of Any Age. Special effects: Well done special effects. Video Occasion: Fit For a Friday Evening. Suspense: Keeps you on the edge of your seat. Overall product rating: Four and a half stars out of five.
Works Cited
Scripture quoted from the King James Version. Pub. 1611, rev. 1769. Software.
Hodge, Bodie. Tower of Babel: The Cultural History of Our Ancestors. Green Forest, AR: New Leaf Pub., 2013. Print.
The Book of Jasher. Translated from the Hebrew into English (1840). Photo lithographic reprint of exact edition published by J.H. Parry & Co., Salt Lake City: 1887. Muskogee, OK: Artisan Pub., 1988. Print, WEB.
bibles.n7nz.org