"C+" Rating by Robert W. Hammerle

While "Get Smart" is for the most part a banal little movie, there are enough funny moments to keep you from engaging in any type of self-loathing as you leave the theater. This is particularly true if you see it with your 16-year-old Saudi exchange student, "Z", as I did. (Yes, he is momentarily back from his homeland, and the quality of my movie experience when seeing frivolous little summer movies like "Smart" is better off for it.)

Steve Carell once again plays an earnest bumbler, in this case as Maxwell Smart, a frustrated Government analyst who wants to be a field agent. Much like his character in the forgettable "Evan Almighty" (2007), his innate likeability keeps the picture from totally disintegrating.

In addition, he is helped along by both Alan Arkin and Anne Hathaway. Arkin is perfectly cast as The Chief, the head of the local spy agency known as "Control." His sourpuss attitude allows him to scowl at anyone and everyone to great effect. While you have to overlook the fact that Ms. Hathaway's character, Agent 99, is apparently so spineless that she falls in love with whomever happens to be her most recent partner in the agency, she nonetheless brings more than just beauty to a role as a butt kicking Control agent.

On the other hand, the plot is a tired old retread left over from one of the many lame James Bond movies from twenty years ago. (Fill in the blank with any one that starred Roger Moore.) Ethnic Russians, led by the enjoyably sinister Terence Stamp, are trying to blackmail the United States with the threat of a nuclear explosion. I half expected Dr. Evil from the first "Austin Powers"(1997) movie to walk on screen and demand a payment of "$1,000,000."

But just when you find yourself sighing at the pitiful plot, something idiotically humorous occurs that truly caused much of the audience to abrupt in gales of laughter. For example, there is a scene where Carell is in the bathroom of a plane in flight as he tries to extricate himself from plastic handcuffs following his mistaken arrest for trying to blow-up the plane. Nearly everyone in the audience was in tears as he continually impaled himself with a miniature crossbow as he tried to shoot tiny-arrows at the cuffs! This moment was so incredibly hysterical that it almost justified the price of admission by itself.

Mr. Carell, who was so sensational as the suicidal gay brother in the tremendous "Little Miss Sunshine" (2006), leaves you wondering how long he will settle for sweet but lightweight roles reflected in this ultimately harmless little romp. While I would like to think that he is capable of greater range, I suppose that having the capacity to make most of us laugh at his own ineptitude is a gift in and of itself.