Movie Review: The Spy Who Dumped Me

The Spy Who Dumped Me ** / *****

Directed by: Susanna Fogel.

Written by: Susanna Fogel & David Iserson.

Starring: Mila Kunis (Audrey), Kate McKinnon (Morgan), Justin Theroux (Drew), Lolly Adefope (Tess), Dustin Demri-Burns (Viktor), Sam Heughan (Sebastian), Hasan Minhaj (Duffer), Mirjam Novak (Verne), Kev Adams (Bitteauto Driver Lukas), Gillian Anderson (Wendy), Ivanna Sakhno (Nadedja), Jane Curtin (Carol), Paul Reiser (Arnie), Fred Melamed (Roger), James Fleet (Tom), Carolyn Pickles (Marsha), Tom Stourton (Edward Snowden).

 

Kate McKinnon is one of the best reasons to continue to watch SNL every week. Even if I think she is overused – she really doesn’t need to play every one of Trump’s minions, does she? – her work is often inspired, and more often than not can make ever mediocre material hilarious, just by her delivery. And yet, in regards to her film work, I keep hearing people say that she needs to be given better material – that her work in films like Rough Night or Office Christmas Party or even the rebooted Ghostbuster (in which she steals the movie) isn’t up to her level. Up until now, I’ve largely agreed with that – but watching The Spy Who Dumped Me – another mediocre comedy in which McKinnon isn’t particularly funny – I could not help but wonder if part of the problem isn’t that McKinnon is just better suited to sketches than in building a character you want to follow for 90 minutes. It works in Ghostbusters – where her character is very one note, because it’s basically one long sketch – but I have yet to see her really, truly become someone else in a movie. She’s always “on”, and always cranked up to 11. She’s hardly the biggest problem with The Spy Who Dumped Me – which would have been a bad movie regardless of who was in her supporting role – but it was the thought that occurred to me because really, the film doesn’t give you anything else to think about.

 

McKinnon isn’t even the lead of The Spy Who Dumped Me – that would be Mila Kunis (another actress who really should get better material – I thought 2010’s Black Swan was going to be a turning point for her, but she seems happy doing these types of comedies). Kunis plays Audrey, who has just been dumped by her boyfriend of a year, Drew (Justin Theroux). He tells her he’ll be by tomorrow to pick up his stuff – and to not do anything with it. But she, and her best friend Morgan (Kate McKinnon) don’t listen – and really aren’t given much a choice. They are contacted pretty soon by some men with guns demanding they turn over what they want – and informed Audrey that Drew really isn’t a podcast host, doing a show on NPR about economics and jazz (I’m pretty sure I’ve listen to that one), but is really in the CIA. And if they don’t get a flash drive from them, many people will die. Through a series of overly complicated plotting, the pair of women end up gallivanting around Europe, never sure who to trust, and shooting a lot of people.

 

Directed by Susanna Fogel, The Spy Who Dumped Me’s major problem is its length – it runs nearly two hours, and feels substantially longer, because the pace of the movie always seems too slow. The action sequences are actually quite good, but the film grinds to a halt because the plot is too complicated, and there are too many characters – almost of all of whom the movie tries to convince is good than evil than good again, over and over again – only ever really settling the question when they end up dead (that means they were bad). The natural charm of Kunis and McKinnon don’t really do much to help proceedings – the don’t have much chemistry together, which doesn’t help matters much. It’s not a good sign when the best performances in the film come from Paul Reiser and Jane Curtain – who are genuinely hilarious as McKinnon’s very supportive parents.

 

The Spy Who Dumped Me reminds me of a movie that will play on a loop on TBS on Sunday afternoons for years to come. Maybe it will play better there, when you can watch as you only kind of pay half attention to it. Giving it your complete attention turns out to be a very dull experience.