Austin Powers in Goldmember [DVD] [2002]

Opening with an action-packed pre-credit James Bond like sequence, with cameos from many of Hollywood's biggest stars gets the movie off to a funny if somewhat irrelevant start, which is great if you like movies within movies, not so great if you don't. From there we get back into the real action with Dr Evil and Myer's latest character Goldmember (a Dutchman with a gold penis and bad skin, which he likes to eat) plotting once more to take over the world. So far so good you might think but herein one of the problems lies: the character Goldmember just isn't funny and is positively poor next to all of Mike Myers other characters, including a disappointingly under-used and very flatulent Fat Bastard who makes a welcome but all too brief return. There are some very funny visual and verbal gags of course and a few clever scenes that retrace Austin Powers and Dr Evil's childhoods but all in all there are just as many hits as misses and too many scenes that are obvious retreads of the previous movies most successful gags, such as the use of silhouettes, telling Sean to zip-it and the Jay-Z "It's A Hard Knock Life" routine. Okay so these scenes are still, to an extent, funny but nowhere near as funny as the first time you saw them.

As for the cast, Myer's is his usual brilliant comedic self, it's just that his self-penned lines are not as good as before. Verne Troyer is once again splendid as Mini Me and Destiny's child's Beyonce Knowles makes a sassy and sexy Foxy Cleopatra, whilst Seth Green (sporting a receding hairline) is quite fabulous as Dr Evil's son Sean. However, the star of the show in my view, is Michael Caine, with a marvellous comedic performance as Austin's father Nigel, delightfully sending up his Harry Palmer persona from the 1960's movies that first made him a star.

As for the movie as a whole, it is probably ideally suited to the DVD format more than any other movie out there, because on DVD you will be able to pick and choose which scenes you watch (and there are some very funny and very imaginative scenes). It is just that all n all you feel that you've seen it all before and seen it done better in the previous instalment. What is more the ending of the film suggests that not only is Mike Myers running out of new ideas for his spoof spy movies but that indeed it may be the end of this very profitable franchise. Still funny but not as funny as its predecessor: Three stars.

Goldmember, a new fourth character played by Mike Myers, is probably the worst character in the history of motion pictures. While he could be slightly amusing on occasion, Goldmember’s unnecessary, disgusting, corny role shot big holes into the movie named for him. The roller skates, the skin-eating, everything about the man turned me off completely; Goldmember makes Fat Bastard look like Cary Grant. The Mole, in my opinion, was yet another terrible character. No one enjoyed Fred Savage’s performance in The Wonder Years as much as I did, but both he and his character looked uncomfortably out of place in the presence of Austin Powers and Dr. Evil. I also, to be quite frank, disapproved mightily of the disservice done to Heather Graham’s character of Felicity Shagwell from the second film; I wanted an explanation for her absence, but all I got was a new character in the form of Foxxy Cleopatra. Beonce Knowles did an admirable job in the role, but to me her character just doesn’t fit, and Austin’s largely absent mojo flexing in the ladies’ department made me feel as if I were watching Austin going about his business as an old man.

All criticism aside, there really are some classic moments in this film. The opening is brilliant, producing some of the most memorable cameo appearances to ever hit the big screen. Even this cannot compare to the scenes featuring the young versions of Austin and Dr. Evil, however. Josh Zuckerman did a great job aping the mannerisms and inflections of Dr. Evil, but Aaron Himelstein was all over the young Austin Powers role; he had Austin’s look, expressions, mannerisms, and voice down pat; it’s really one of the most impressive impersonation jobs I’ve ever seen. The humor and entertainment, though, are just too few and far between for the movie as a whole. I think the plot holes could have been plugged effectively by a couple of the deleted scenes included on the DVD, yet a number of those deleted scenes were mercifully cut from the final print before doing even more self-inflicted damage to this disappointing sequel of a sequel. I think Mike Myers got too caught up in the whole Austin Powers frenzy, placing the characters before the story itself. The result is, by and large, a second-rate parody of a formerly ingenious parody.