Make it stop! Another big screen version of a beloved TV show.another utterly crap movie. Throughout the sixties, Don Adams and Barbara Feldon delighted audiences as Agents 86 and 99 respectively, two operatives for CONTROL, who battled evil across the globe, usually in the form of the terrorist organisation CHAOS. Created by sharp comic minds Mel Brooks and Buck Henry, Get Smart now sits as one of the seminal sitcoms. It was only a matter of time before some moron executive at a Hollywood studio realised that there was a cash cow grazing out in the back fields that could be fattened up and served to a huge group of modern cinematic diners. Unfortunately, it's been fattened up with garbage, and it tastes pretty bad.

The plot (some nonsense about stolen nuclear weapons) is irrelevant, but the disappointments are many. Firstly, the intended "sexual tension" between Steve Carell and Anne Hathaway is absolutely ridiculous. They look more like father and daughter than potential lovers, and they never seem genuinely attracted to each other at any stage of the film. Considering that that's the driving factor behind the whole film, Get Smart never has a chance. Though Carell (a truly gifted comic actor) and Hathaway (at her loveliest and most charming) are individually fine, they never really click as a team, which was always the best thing about the TV series. Secondly, director Peter Segal (The Longest Yard, 50 First Dates) unwisely decides to turn this into an ersatz action flick, complete with elaborate chase and fight sequences. These merely pull away from the humour, and stretch the whole increasingly tedious deal out to a very unwelcome near-two-hour running time. Amusing supporting performances (Alan Arkin is funny as The Chief, and Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson has a good time as the cocky Agent 23) help dull the pain, but it's not enough. Touches of racism (an Arab on a plane is immediately identified as a "bad guy") and the fact that all of the best gags are featured in the trailer ultimately sink what was already a quickly descending ship.