Spy Kids (2001)

Robert Rodriguez

USA

90 mins, color, English

True to the Rodriguez way, SPY KIDS is a nonstop action film with nicely choreographed sequences, humor, and imagination. However, since this is a kids' film after all, the violence is sanitized to the point that it failed to involve me with the supposed trauma/plight of the children and their parents, which, given the film's pro-family message, ruined its effect and efficacy.

The story concerns two retired top spies, Gregorio Cortez (Antonio Banderas) and Ingrid (Carla Gugino), who have quit the adrenaline rush of international high espionage/assassination in order to form the quintessential family unit and raise two children, Carmen (Alexa Vega) and Juni (Daryl Sabara). By concealing their chequered past from their kids, the parents have sown the seeds of family problems. Neither Carmen nor Juni seems to have much respect for them, thinking that they are boring and perhaps even cowardly. Both siblings lie about their school experiences, where the more assertive Carmen skips classes for unknown purpose and Juni invents imaginary friends to substitute for the racist abuse he suffers as a Hispanic in a predominantly white school.

All this is about to change when Gregorio and Ingrid receive a distress call from their former employers asking for help against some villain who has been kidnapping secret agents. The duo decides to respond, entrusts the children to an "uncle," and departs, only to be trapped by Fegan Floop (Alan Cumming) and his evil Minion (Tony Shalhoub), who are the evil geniuses busy building an army of kid killer robots. The only problem with this Village of the Damned borrowing is that the robots are darned dumb, lacking brains and all, which Floop-Minion hope to rectify by having Gregorio divulge a secret artificial brain he had built while working for the spy agency. The kids then have to rescue their parents.

The healthy message of the film is transparent and, that not being enough, bluntly reiterated at several points throughout. Simply put, family matters, but it needs to be worked at, with relationships built on trust and sharing. Such a nice and old-fashioned message (this does not mean I don't agree with it, which, in fact, I do) bundled as a candy bar, sweet with Disney-like fantasy entertainment. All the action is wild in hyperkinetic speed but restrained in violence. There is humor even in the most tense situations, which, of course, relieve the tension. This may work for kids, but for me it spoiled the film. I am not bloodthirsty and I enjoy crazy stuff as much as the next Tim Burton fan, but by sacrificing tension Rodriguez undermines the danger to the characters, and thus both their transformation and their victory seem hollow and somewhat insignificant. The film ends with a happy family reunion (and an annoying bit of overt moralizing by the youngster), the unwilling evil genius is reformed, the willing evil genius is punished, and the robot kids do only good. A typical "happily ever after" ending, which would have been far more convincing had the characters actually been through more than a CGI bonanza.

This brings me to another complaint. I understand the actors did all their wire work themselves with no doubles. Kudos to them, of course, but shame on the director who could not conceal it. The action sequences suffer from obvious problems, which could have been avoided with some imagination. As an example, Summo Hung directed his girlfriend in many action films and although she can't even fake fighting, his creativity hides it and she is almost credible even when paired with well-known acrobats and subjected to the high expectations of HK action. Rodriguez chose to distract the viewers with CGI effects, which, unfortunately, where not terribly good either. I am no doubt spoiled by all the recent rush to do animation, but still, there were some glaring deficiencies in this one, especially evident in the chase sequences.

In any case, Rodriguez set out to make a fantasy kids' film with a healthy message, and in that he succeeds although this adult was less than thrilled by it. I must say that Alexa Vega was pretty convincing as the older sister.

September 19, 2001.