Spies Like Us (1985) starring Chevy Chase, Dan Aykroyd, Steve Forrest, Donna Dixon, Bruce Davison, Bernie Casey directed by John Landis Movie Review

Spies Like Us (1985)   3/53/53/53/53/5


Dan Aykroyd and Chevy Chase in Spies Like Us (1985)

Chuckle Mission

When the US Government have a top mission they take the decision to send not just two agents but four with two of them acting as dispensable decoys. Those dispensable decoys turn out to be Emmett Fitz-Hume (Chevy Chase) and Austin Millbarge (Dan Aykroyd) who are oblivious to the fact that their mission is to act as decoys as they end up in one scrape after another.

I like Chevy Chase, I Like Dan Aykroyd, I like Chevy Chase and Dan Aykroyd together in 80s comedy "Spies Like Us" but then like is not the word I feel I should be using, I feel it should be love but I don't. The trouble is that rather than being the riot of comedy a movie starring Chase and Aykroyd shout be, let alone one directed by John Landis, it ends up a movie of minor chuckles and several jokes which fail to deliver the laughs intended. Even back in the 80s jokes about saying the wrong thing in a foreign language were ordinary.

This is the biggest problem which "Spies Like Us" has as whilst Chase and Aykroyd work well together so few of their jokes actually cause you to do more than chuckle. It ends up making the movie one which only really entertains when a cameo appears which is what director John Landis seems to love. The trouble is that the stuff in between outweighs it and at times even the humour of Chevy Chase doing accident prone or womanizing becomes tiresome. Although saying that you have to say there is something weird about scenes where Chevy's character comes on to the character played by Donna Dixon as Aykroyd and Dixon had been married since 1983.

What this all boils down to is that "Spies Like Us" is a bit of 80s fun with Chevy Chase and Dan Aykroyd delivering some stereotypical fun. But in many ways being stereotypical is its problem as it ends up only amusing rather than laugh out loud funny which is what you really want.


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