** (out of ****)
Starring Daryl Sabara, Antonio Banderas, Carla Gugino, Alexa Vega, Ricardo Montalban, Sylvester Stallone, Salma Hayek, Mike Judge, and Steve Buscemi
Directed & written by Robert Rodriguez
2003 PG
Really, there’s no such thing as a bad premise. There are only bad executions. A boy enters a virtual reality video game to rescue his sister. Along the way he makes friends, makes enemies, meets a nice girl, gets into a motor race, surfs across lava, and watches giant robots fight. And it’s in 3-D, why not? Preposterous and absurd, but certainly not unworkable. If the execution is good, the virtual world is breathtaking, the action sequences are exciting, and all that usual stuff about good storytelling and well-drawn characters. But if the execution is not so good…
Alas, “Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over” is more bad execution than good. I think its visuals may have had potential. There’s a highspeed motorcross through floating tunnels and giant bridges, hovering over bottomless, cloudy voids, in which we fly alongside our characters as they plunge and spin all around us. The surfing and swimming through the lava is directed just as well, and at one point Juni and his adversary do battle on floating circuit boards, while smaller polygons drift through the air like snowflakes. I don’t mind that everything except the characters themselves are obvious computer animation and not at all “realistic” or “convincing.” What bothered me is how everything is so murky and headache-y when seen through those silly 3-D lenses.
If “Spy Kids 3-D” were shown on the giant IMAX 3-D screen, like the recent “Space Station” or “Cyberworld 3D,” and cost between ten and seventeen bucks a pop, it would use the vastly superior IMAX 3-D technology. “Cyberworld 3D,” an entirely animated feature, is bright, clear, detailed, and filled with frighteningly deep chasms and skies. But, as a fan of popcorn moviemaking both past and present, writer-director Robert Rodriguez has resorted to the same cheesy red-and-blue 3-D technology of the 1950s, perhaps as an homage to days gone by. Ug. Someday a 2-D version of “Spy Kids 3-D” will be available on DVD and VHS, and will probably look a lot better. But the story will still be clunky, the child-acting will still be a tad wooden, and the missed opportunities for gags will be just as obvious.
“Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over” has that quality essential to two-star movies of just feeling sloppy and awkward, of feeling more cobbled than edited, of sudden energy instead of mounting excitement. Early on, important plot points are blurted out faster than we can absorb them. There’s nothing wrong with a clothesline plot, but sometimes there’s nothing more annoying than a clothesline plot that isn’t explained clearly. Near the end of the film, Mike Judge asks Salma Hayek, “which side just won?” and we sympathize with his confusion. Yet, “Spy Kids 3-D” is able to do that amazing feat of being confusing and simple at the same time. The finer points were a blur to me, but I knew all that really mattered was that Our Heroes get from Point A to Point B. This kind of simplistic trek brought down last year’s “Spy Kids 2: The Island of Lost Dreams,” which also lacked any real intrigues or twists between the two locations.
But onto the plot. “Spy Kids 3-D” picks up with Our Heroes from the previous two "Spy Kids" movies, the pint-sized crime stoppers Juni and Carmen Cortez (Daryl Sabara and Alexa Vega), who are themselves the offspring of international secret agents (Antonio Banderas and Carlo Gugino). Our Spy Kids are a little older, while their mother has only gotten younger and hotter. It must be tough on poor Juni: just as he’s entering that difficult age, the best looking thing around is his mom. Anyway, Carmen is being held hostage in a virtual world created by the evil Toymaker (Sylvester Stallone), who was himself trapped there long ago by the spy organization. There’s more to it than that, like why his mind is trapped there but he is able to shape it and market it. Never explained is why the spies just can’t find his inert body or turn the virtual world off. All this is glossed over in quick conversations that don’t make sense, but let’s just forgive the movie that particular sin. So Juni enters the virtual world to rescue his sister, where we hope there will be breathtaking sights, amazing chases, fun pals, etc.
First of all the friends he meets aren’t that interesting. Mashed together from spiky skater haircuts and hackneyed locker-room tough-talking, they can’t seem to make up their minds if they’re going to help Juni or betray him. Next we have the movie’s sense of humor, which is in the right place, but not as abundant as it could be. Video games are so ripe for a good roasting, but “Spy Kids 3-D” is slight in this department. Compare it to that episode of “Futurama” where the conquering aliens from the planet Nintendon 64 march off their spaceships and announce “all your base are belong to us.” Still, the scenes in which the other gamers suspect Juni of being The Guy (that is, The Guy from the cover of the video game’s box) are amusing. This leads to the movie’s single best scene, in which the real The Guy makes an appearance, and I won’t dare reveal who plays him.
Aside from The Guy, virtually every scene is stolen by Ricardo Montalban as Juni’s wheelchair-bound grandfather. We sense there could have been real weight given to his quest to walk again and confront the villainous Toymaker. Most of Montalban’s dialogue seems to be slightly altered lines from his great over-the-top performance in “Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.” Fans of that film will hoot with laughter every time Montalban is on the screen. Speaking of over-the-top, Sylvester Stallone is moderately entertaining as the Toymaker, and also as the three alter-egos he has created to keep himself company. To rekindle the battle of “Star Trek II,” a friend of mine felt that Stallone’s character should have been played by William Shatner. I would go one more step and suggest that Shatner should play the villain and two of his alter-egos, while the third alter-ego is played by Leonard Nimoy.
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