Bargain Alert: Get Smart Complete Series for Under $40

Would you believe... you can get Get Smart - The Complete Series (that's all five seasons, plus bonus content!) for just $39.96 this week on Amazon? That's cheaper than buying each bargain-priced season individually! The massive 25-disc box set also includes copious bonus features not available in the individual season sets. This collection cost hundreds when it first come out! This is quite a deal for one of the funniest spy comedies ever, and an essential part of any comprehensive library of spy TV. I recommend acting now and not missing it by that much!

Tradecraft: Actresses Turn Spy Producers

Tradecraft: Actresses Turn Spy Producers

Actresses Anne Hathaway (Get Smart, The Dark Knight Rises) and Ellen Pompeo (Grey's Anatomy, Catch Me if You Can) are both trying their hands as first-time producers—and they're both starting out with spy projects. Deadline reports that Pompeo has sold a TV series to ABC dealing with the DSS, or Diplomatic Security Service. The DSS is a fascinating branch of U.S. law enforcement because they're the most widely spread out around the world, and (I believe) the only one to routinely carry arms overseas. Part of the DSS's mandate is protective service for American diplomats including the Secretary of State, and I believe this is the branch that Pompeo's project will primarily focus on since it's based on an Elle Magazine article about female bodyguards. But the DSS also handles counterterrorism and counterintelligence. In fact, they're the ones who would investigate a CIA agent attached to an American embassy overseas if the agent became suspect. I've long thought that the DSS were ripe for a good movie or TV project (and have even gotten as far as a treatment for one myself), so I'll be interested to see where this project goes. The Rock actually played a DSS agent in Fast Five, but the agency itself wasn't explored at all. In that case, it was merely a means to have a heavily armed American law enforcement officer firing off a lot of rounds in a foreign country. According to the trade blog, Pompeo's untitled pilot is being written by Mike Sussman, who created the upcoming TNT drama Perception. "The TV project will revolve around Diplomatic Security special agents who travel the world protecting American officials on diplomatic missions and will explore the personal and professional challenges these young women and men face while taking on one of the most dangerous jobs in the country. Sussman will write the drama and will executive produce with Pompeo for ABC Studios."

Meanwhile, The Hollywood Reporter reports that former Agent 99 and current Catwoman Anne Hathaway "has closed a deal" with Paramount to produce and star in the thriller Puzzler. Very few details are available on the project, which will be written by Karl Gajdusek (Trespass), but according to the trade, "the project is described as a female-driven, paranoid thriller in the vein of Three Days of the Condor." That sounds spy-like to me...

New Spy DVDs Out This Week

From HBO Home Video comes the fifth and final season of Get Smart, just in time for Christmas. While the massive Time-Life box set was a great package, overflowing with all sorts of cool extras, these single season releases really are one of the best bargains out there on the spy market. With retail only $24.98, the season is currently on sale for just $15.99 at Amazon! That's high value for your dollar. Season 5 remarkably manages to maintain the quality of the previous four seasons, and finds Max and 99 married and expecting twins as KAOS wreaks its usual havoc and Max wreaks even more. The perfect stocking stuffer!

Meanwhile, in England, Network unleashes two impressive spy-related Web Exclusive sets on PAL Region 2 DVD this week. I discussed the pre-Mission Impossible Peter Graves ITC Western Whiplash at length yesterday. This Australian-set adventure series will be of interest to ITC aficionados, and Graves fans will find it essential.

Also out from Network is a series I wouldn't have suspected to be particularly spy-related, but turns out to be of great interest to Avengers fans: Zodiac. This mystery series only lasted for one brief season in 1974, but it was created and largely written by Roger Marshall, one of the primary creative forces behind The Avengers. (The yin to Brian Clemens' yang, perhaps; the two men both contributed immensely to the series we know and love, but rarely saw eye-to-eye.) So what, you say? Marshall was also responsible for The Public Eye, and as awesome as that low-key detective series is, it certainly doesn't have much in common with The Avengers! Well, that's true, and I didn't expect much in that way from Zodiac either, but it turns out to have a great deal in common with The Avengers! Police detective Anton Rodgers (The Prisoner) and talented amateur (in this case, an astrologer) Anouska Hempel (The Persuaders!, Tiffany Jones) very much echo the best aspects of the Steed and Peel relationship. Rodgers, in fact, makes a damn good Steed surrogate (if you can excuse his wretched Seventies fashions and haircut) and sex siren Hempel is a much more credible Peel-type than I would have imagined. The repartee is great, and Avengers fans will definitely want to seek out this rarity. I'll be discussing Zodiac more in the next day or two. Both series are available only through Network's website.

New Spy DVDs Out This Week (And Last)

The biggest spy release of the week by far (first reported here way back in April) isn't in the United States. It's the top-notch spy parody sequel OSS 117: Rio ne répond plus, which is out today in France (PAL, Region 2) on DVD and Blu-Ray, both available from Amazon.fr. Extras include English subtitles, an audio commentary with director Michel Hazanavicius and star Jean Dujardin (in French, naturally), two featurettes ("OSS 117 : cavalcade à Rio," "La province ne répond plus… de rien"), deleted scenes, a gag reel and the trailer. While not quite as funny as its hilarious predecessor, OSS 117: Cairo Nest of Spies, OSS 117: Rio ne répond plus (aka OSS 117: Lost In Rio) is about as perfect a sequel as you could hope for. Jean Dujardin is simply amazing as the cluelessly (almost innocently) chauvinist and racist secret agent who embodies the attitudes of his time even as times are changing all around him. Hazanavicius once again does an impeccable job of recreating the look and filmmaking techniques of the era, this time the late Sixties instead of the late Fifties setting of the first film. While making fun of the attitudes of the era, OSS 117: Rio ne répond plus is at the same time a love letter to the films of the era. It homages everything from On Her Majesty's Secret Service to Our Man Flint to Matt Helm to, of course, the original (serious) OSS 117 films–and even ventures farther afield to include nods to Harper, Hitchcock and Elvis movies. Like the first film, the sequel manages to masterfully combine smart, irreverent satire with slapstick physical comedy with winning results. It is an absolute must-see for fans of Sixties spy movies. As far as I know there is still no U.S. distributor. I have no doubt that it will find one (it took a couple of years for us to get the first movie), but in the meantime the only way to see it so far is on the French disc, which does include English subtitles. Also out this week are double feature configurations including both OSS 117: Cairo Nest Of Spies and OSS 117: Rio ne répond plus on DVD and Blu-Ray.

Also available in Europe this week is Network's standalone release of their interview with star Richard Bradford from their DVD collection of the classic Sixties ITC spy show Man In A Suitcase. In Character: Richard Bradford, which I reported on in more detail last week, is available from Network's website. It is a Region 2 PAL release.

Here in America, we get Get Smart: Season 4 on its own today. It's been available for a while in the feature-laden box set from Time Life, but at the loss of a couple of extras, now you can get it on its own at a budget price. Season 4 is the one where Max and 99 finally tie the knot.

I didn't get to do a DVD post last week, but we got some good spy releases then, too. For starters, Fox brought us Units galore. Season Four of David Mamet's covert operations drama is available on DVD and Blu-Ray with copious special features (commentaries, deleted scenes and featurettes), and the entire, prematurely truncated four season run is all collected in The Unit: The Complete Giftset.

Finally, and perhaps most impressively, Acorn Media unleashed Foyle's War: Sets 1-5: From Dunkirk to VE Day. While I knew that this British wartime mystery series was masterminded by Alex Rider creator Anthony Horowitz, I had never actually realized that it was a spy show! But I suppose the very nature of police work in wartime dictates that DCI Foyle (played sublimely by the screen's best Bill Tanner, Michael Kitchen) routinely encounters foreign agents and saboteurs–and just as routinely crosses paths with (or steps on the toes of) MI-5 and other British spy agencies. This is a remarkable series, where the mysteries play second fiddle to the fabulous characters and the engrossing period setting. And besides Kitchen, you'll spot lots of familiar spy faces throughout the series. The first few episodes alone boast Bond babe Rosamund Pike, Casino Royale's Tanneresque Tobias Menzies and For Your Eyes Only dayplayers Paul Brooke and Charles Dance, the latter of whom of course also played Ian Fleming in the 1989 TV movie Goldeneye: The Secret Life of Ian Fleming. And there's a character named Fleming in the Foyle's War episode he stars in. Knowing Horowitz's admiration for 007, I don't think it's a coincidence. (There's a good interview with Horowitz included among the bonus features where he talks about how he comes up with character names.) I'll have a more in-depth review of Foyle's War soon, but it's well worth checking out for spy fans.

Upcoming Spy DVDs: Get Smart: Season 5

Even spy parodies were not immune to the awful fashions that plagued the genre as the Sixties became the Seventies, as evidenced by Max's garish wardrobe on the cover of Get Smart's fifth and final season. Get Smart: Season 5 hits stores on December 8 according to TV Shows On DVD. Retail is a mere $24.99 (and sure to be even less at various online outlets, of course), making it a bargain on its own, but if you want all of Get Smart with all the bells and whistles, then it's worth shelling out for the Complete Series. Season 5 finds Max and 99 married and expecting twins as KAOS wreaks its usual havoc and Max wreaks even more. Season 4 was originally announced for September 4, but has since been rescheduled for October 6. Still, by the end of the year, all five seasons will be available on their own from HBO Home Video!

Upcoming Spy DVDs: Double Dose Of Don Adams

Good news for all the Don Adams fans out there! Would you believe... two new DVD releases on the horizon... on the same day? First, for all those who didn't shell out for the giant TimeLife Get Smart set, HBO Home Video continue their releases of individual seasons with Get Smart: Season 4 on September 4. According to TV Shows On DVD, the four-disc set (containing twenty-six episodes) will, as usual for this series, be available at the bargain price of $24.98–and certainly even less at various online retailers. Adams' other famous spyish character, Inspector Gadget, will also finally return to DVD that same day, from Fox Home Entertainment. (A Season One set was released years ago by Shout! Factory, but has since gone out of print and shot up in value.) Inspector Gadget: The Go Go Gadget Collection will be a single-disc release containing eight episodes of the classic cartoon. TV Shows On DVD has all the details.

New Spy DVDs Out This Week: International, Smart

Today sees the release of Tom Tykwer's The International on DVD and Blu-Ray courtesy of Sony. The International is a very different sort of entry in the current neo-Eurospy wave than Taken and The Transporter. Rather than focusing on wall-to-wall action or sexy Russian party girls, it instead plays up another side of the genre: the fabulous locations. By limiting the action, Tykwer is also able to focus more on a complex plot and character. Ultimately, The International is a character piece about Clive Owen's disgraced Interpol agent Louis Salinger. That doesn't mean, however, that it is devoid of action. Far from it. There are several very exciting setpieces, all in fantastic international locations, but the highlight of the film is undoubtedly a ten-minute-long shootout in New York's Guggenheim Museum. It's an astonishingly orchestrated sequence, and one that will make action fans want to seek out this film even if it isn't a total action movie. The DVD also boasts a featurette about creating that sequence, which I can't wait to see. Read my full review of the movie here.

Also out today is Get Smart: Season 3 from HBO Home Video. If you haven't already gotten the deluxe Complete Series set (which comes loaded with bonus features you won't find on these individual season releases) and you don't care about those extras, then these seasons are an excellent bargain. (Amazon is offering Season 3 for just $15.99.) They're also decidedly more compact than the chunky box set, and will ultimately take up less space on your shelf. Finally, they're not completely devoid of extras. Previous seasons have included introductions by Barbara Feldon and select commentary. As the discs themselves appear to be identical to those in the Complete Series set, presumably this season will be the same.

Tradecraft: Zigzag And Smart

Agent Zigzag Gets Writer

Variety reports that Race To Witch Mountain co-writer Mark Bomback will pen the previously announced adaptation of Ben Macintyre's Agent Zigzag for Tom Hanks's company, Playtone. The book was acquired by New Line for Hanks to produce during a bidding war in 2007. Macintyre also wrote last year's Ian Fleming Centenary book For Your Eyes Only: Ian Fleming + James Bond. Agent Zigzag is the true story of a charming criminal who was trained by the Germans to spy on the British during WWII, but instead offered his services as a double agent to the British.

Smart Sequel Delayed

In an article about Get Smart director Pete Segal helming the Ben Stiller threequel Little Fockers, Variety mentions that the Smart sequel has been delayed: "Segal was expecting to return as the director of Get Smart 2 this year but became available when Steve Carell instead made a deal to team with Tina Fey in the Shawn Levy-directed comedy Date Night for Fox." The trade does make it clear, though, that Smart is still a priority for the director. "If the stars align, Segal will direct Little Fockers and have plenty of time to complete his work and be ready to helm Get Smart 2 for Warner Bros. and Village Roadshow Pictures."

Upcoming Spy DVDs: Si, Baroni!

The Baron Comes to America!

I’m so happy that other distributors have finally picked up the slack that A&E left dangling when they stopped distributing Sixties ITC classics in America. Last year we got Jason King from Image, and early next year (March 10, as reported by TVShowsOnDVD) Koch Media will release The Baron: The Complete Series in Region 1. Now if only someone would step up to distribute Man In A Suitcase and Department S (and if A&E would give use the long overdue second volumes of The Champions and Randall & Hopkirk, Deceased), we Americans would have a pretty thorough library of classic ITC adventure series! The Baron stars American Steve Forrest (who would go on to star in S.W.A.T. in the Seventies) as John Creasey’s titular antiques dealer-cum-spy (here reimagined as a cattle baron instead of a member of the peerage to accommodate Forrest’s accent) in this entertaining Saint imitator from one of the producers of the Roger Moore hit. The series was pretty uneven in terms of quality, but the good episodes make it well worth seeing for fans of The Saint. It even spawned a feature film in Europe, made by editing together two of the series' best episodes. The Ipcress File’s Sue Lloyd co-starred in The Baron. There’s no word yet on extras, but I’d expect this to follow the typical American pattern and be bare bones. Network’s UK version and Umbrella’s Australian release both contain the same fantastic assortments of extras usually associated with those companies. TVShowsOnDVD reports that the price is expected to be in the $55-$75 range, but Amazon has the series (rather creatively listed) available to pre-order for just $41.99.

Get Smart Cheap

For spy fans on a budget (or comedy fans who love Don Adams–but only in smallish doses), HBO Home Video continues their release of single seasons of the beloved series that same day, March 10, with Get Smart: The Complete Second Season, reports TVShowsOnDVD. Like their standalone release of the first season, this set will not include the feature-laden bonus disc that come in The Complete Series Gift Set. It should, however, contain the episode introductions from Barbara Feldon, so you do get a lot of value for your dollar at the bargain price of $24.99. (Cheaper, of course, on Amazon.)

New Spy DVDs Out This Week

The fall trend continues. Once again, there are tons of new spy DVDs out this week! Seriously, today is a very expensive day for spy completists. On the other hand, a lot of these are gift sets or repackaging of (mostly) previously available material, but they're still appealing. Today's column actually makes a great gift guide for the discriminating spy fan on your Christmas list!

Get Smart (2008)

First up, from Warner Bros. we have the DVD debut of last summer's bigscreen remake of Get Smart, starring Steve Carell and Anne Hathaway. Despite its impressive star power, the movie itself failed to impress me too much. Surprisingly, it turned out to largely be a rehash of a previous underwhelming Sixties TV remake, I Spy (really, it's amazing how similar the two movies are, right down to The Rock playing the Gary Cole role)... with a few dollops of Rowan Atkinson's superior spy comedy Johnny English tossed in, and just a tad of the original Get Smart. It does have its moments, though, and I would have liked to see it get a better DVD. Read my review to find out what I didn't like about this so-called "Special Edition," but it's one of the more disappointing spy DVD releases of late. However, it still might be worth picking up in the exclusive Best Buy version (pictured), which reader Delmo alerted me to below. This one comes in limited edition shoe phone packaging!

Get Smart: The Complete Series

If you're more of a Get Smart purist, however, you'll be thrilled to know that the complete original series starring Don Adams and Barbara Feldon hits stores today on DVD! The set (neatly housed in cool phone booth packaging) has been available for almost two years exclusively from TimeLife's website. The retail version will still cost $199.95 (but for 138 episodes and over nine hours of bonus material on twenty-five discs, you get your money's worth), but consumers will now be able to benefit from the deep discounts frequently applied by popular online retailers like Amazon or DeepDiscount.

The Wild Wild West: The Complete Series

This one's pretty divisive among fans so far. If you don't have any Wild Wild West yet, then it's a no brainer: you get every episode of this enormously entertaining Sixties Spy/Western hybrid series, all the extras included on Season One, and the two made-for-TV reunion movies, Wild Wild West Revisited (1979) and More Wild Wild West (1980), both available on DVD for the first time with this set. If you've already bought all four seasons individually, then that's the sticking point. It's a little bit annoying that Paramount is asking the show's fans to buy everything twice if they want the complete collection. Hopefully, they'll eventually release the bonus disc on its own, but there's been no such announcement so far. The packaging is a bit odd, with all the discs separated only by thin pieces of cardboard. You can't tell which disc it is without pulling it out. I'm not sure why they didn't just bundle the original slim packs, but I guess they wanted people to feel like they were getting something special... and big.

Despite the set's flaws, the bonus disc is certainly a treat. The first movie finds James West pulled out of retirement, where he's been living the Flint lifestyle with four women. His old partner Artemus Gordon quickly whips him back into shape (in one of the movie's better moments, Jim actually shaves his mustache off with a straight razor while doing sit-ups!), and the two of them hit the trail once again. (Actually, the track... and this time their train can actually be seen in aerial shots travelling through real wilderness!) The enemy is the son of their old foe Dr. Miguelito Loveless. Paul Williams steps into the shoes of the late Michael Dunn. His plot involves creating bionic people (including a "$600 man") and replacing world leaders like Queen Victoria and President Cleveland with his own doubles, Dr. Noah-style. The second reunion movie (for which Jim actually retains his mustache the whole time) features Jonathan Winters as the diabolical mastermind.

The Wild Wild West: The Complete Series is certainly something every Sixties spy fan (and particularly Avengers fan) should check out if they haven't already.

The Bourne Trilogy

This is simply yet another new repackaging from Universal of the three Bourne movies. It's a convenient way to buy them all together if you don't own them yet, but the new set does not include the fantastic bonus disc, The Ludlum Files, which was included with previous box sets, nor the Ultimatum bonus disc included with Best Buy's exclusive version.

Flashbacks of a Fool

Finally, from Anchor Bay we have the Daniel Craig passion project which got wide theatrical release in Britain last spring, and a very limited, completely unadvertised run here in the U.S. a few weeks ago. I've wanted to see this for quite a while (owing both to Craig and the Roxy Music-heavy glam soundtrack) and I'm glad that Anchor Bay is capitalizing on Quantum of Solace by finally giving it a decent American release.

DVD Review: Get Smart (2008)

This summer’s hit spy comedy Get Smart gets an embarrassing bare-bones DVD release masquerading under a very attractive lenticular cover as a two disc special edition. Once you get past that awful Warner Bros. anti-piracy thing that pirates scenes from Casablanca, you get no features, no commentary, just the movie itself. And, of course, the highly touted "Comedy Optimization Mode."

Don’t you hate navigating menus to select deleted scenes? Don’t you wish there were a less convenient way to watch them? At the same time, isn’t watching a movie on DVD too easy? Instead of plunking yourself down on your couch and just letting the movie play out, don’t you wish you had to push buttons on your remote control every couple of minutes? Well, Warner Bros. has anticipated your problem! And to solve it, they’ve devised the single most annoying way to watch a movie, and possibly the worst ever DVD bell or whistle. If you want to see deleted scenes or alternate takes, you need to select the "Comedy Optimization Mode." In an un-skippable introduction, Steve Carell explains that this makes the movie 62% funnier. It does not. It does, however, make it approximately 62% more irritating, though. Carell explains that at certain times an icon of a phone booth will pop up, you might imagine somewhat akin to the famous Matrix "follow the white rabbit" feature. When you see the icon, you can press a button on your remote and see the deleted scene or alternate take. It’s not a little icon, though. It’s a giant, ugly graphic that takes up the whole entire screen! (Pictured above in all its glory.) Furthermore, it cuts in at inopportune moments, often interrupting actors mid-word. And the alternate takes are rarely worth the inconvenience. Well, perhaps some of them would be (like the extra Bill Murray bits), but the feature was so aggravating that I gave up on it after a while. I would have preferred a simple menu of deleted material, then maybe I’d know. But you can’t access the deleted scenes any other way. Rather than "optimizing" the comedy, this atrocious featurette steps on it and frequently diminishes it.

Luckily, there’s a whole second disc, right? Well, yes... but sadly far too much space on it is taken up with one of those hideous "digital copies" no one cares about, so there’s no room for proper bonus features. What we get is a 14-minute Making-of featurette called "The Right Agent for the Right Job." It’s not an in-depth documentary, but just an EPK, with everyone saying nice things about each other. It does have its moments, though, including some good footage of Anne Hathaway reading for the part of Agent 99 opposite Steve Carell. The two start improvising, and it’s easy to see why she got the role. That’s good stuff. Carell explains that he was concerned that Anne Hathaway wouln’t be hot enough to share the screen with him, which is funny at first, but then the bit goes on too long. Overall, this is a featurette more concerned with cracking jokes than telling you anything about the movie. Both stars seem surprised that the movie turned out to be an action movie, which may explain something.

An even shorter featurette, "Max In Moscow" (about filming in Red Square) played in a truncated version with commercials before movies last summer, and it’s nice to have it included, but not nice enough to justify the disc’s "Special Edtion" moniker. Neither is "Language Lessons," a silly sketch with Carell speaking made up versions of French and German and Italian to promote the DVD. It’s slight, but funny. (Fake German is always funny, and Carell–unsurprisingly–does it well.) There’s also a Gag Reel, but not really much there. Besides a few amusing Carell ad-libs and mess-ups, it’s mostly just people blowing their lines in a way that might be funny if you were on set... but not at home watching a DVD. This highlight is a brief snippet of Carell doing a Don Adams impression, indicating a possible alternate direction the movie could have gone that might have actually worked better than it sounds. Rounding out the "Special Edition" is a 3-minute promo for the DVD spinoff Get Smart’s Bruce and Lloyd Out of Control.

I didn’t care much for the 2008 version of Get Smart, but the movie did have its moments, and both Carell and Hathaway were inspired choices for the lead roles who acquitted themselves nicely. The movie had some decent spy action and some good parody, and even if the two didn’t ultimately mix that well, either one of them would have normally justified a DVD purchase. But it’s hard to get very excited about a disc this poorly conceived and executed. I hope that Warner Bros. is working on a more elaborate Special Edition to coincide with the inevitable sequel. Assuming so, it’s worth waiting for now.

Tradecraft: Nick Nack Biopic And Smart Sequel

Da plane, boss, da plane!

One of James Bond's most unusual adversaries will soon be the subject of a big budget Hollywood biopic: Variety reports that My Dinner With Hervé chronicles the wild, tragic life of diminutive superstar Hervé Villechaize, who played Scaramanga's henchman Nick Nack in The Man With the Golden Gun and went on to star as Tattoo on Fantasy Island. Schindler's List writer Steve Zaillian will produce, and Terminal writer Sacha Gervasi will write and direct. Gervasi conducted the last interview with the actor days before his suicide in 1993. The trade quotes Gervasi as saying, "Hervé wasn’t just a pop culture icon; he was one of the most charming, cultured and dangerous people I’ve ever met. His is the story of a unique misfit trying to find his place in the world." No word yet on who will play Villechaize (though I bet Leonard DiCaprio is trying to think of ways to appear smaller), or who will play Roger Moore. (I nominate Steve Coogan!)

This is a very exciting project, and one I can't wait to see come to fruition. Villechaize, a notorious ladies' man, was an amazing, larger-than-life personality, and Moore, Christopher Lee, Britt Ekland and others have all related hilarious stories in the past about working with the actor on The Man With the Golden Gun.

Smart Writers

In a story about Steve Carell signing on to play Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Brigadier Gerard in a Napoleonic comedy (which sounds as potentially delightful as it does weird, doesn't it?), Variety mentions in passing some new information about Warner Bros.' Get Smart sequel. The trade reports that it will be written by the same scribes as the first film, Tom Astle and Matt Ember, and that Carell is still mooting the second Smart movie as one of two he'll try to fit into his next Office hiatus.

Tradecraft: Smart And Circle

Matarese Moves Forward

Variety reports that David Cronenberg is in talks to direct Denzel Washington in the Robert Ludlum adaptation The Matarese Circle for MGM. Michael Brandt and Derek Haas were previously announced as the screenwriters on the project. Former Warner Bros. topper Lorenzo di Bonaventura is producing. The novel, which follows an American agent and a Russian agent forced to team up to thwart a plot to topple both their governments, is considered one of Ludlum's most ripe for filming. There's no word on whether the story will take place in its original Cold War setting or be updated, but given the current chilly climate between America and Russia, it wouldn't be too difficult to update. I'd imagine that's the path they'll take, following the success of the contemporary Bourne movies. I'm really glad to get an update on this project, because there hadn't been much public movement since early April despite the high price the studio paid for the property. I think Cronenberg is a fantastic choice. His recent Eastern Promises was a terrific, adult action thriller, and I think he'll bring a very interesting, smart point of view to the Ludlum material.

Get Smarterer

Unsurprisingly given its success, Warner Bros. is moving forward with a big screen sequel to its summer spy hit Get Smart, according to Variety. The Steve Carell update of the Sixties television classic earned the studio $130 million domestically and $230 million worldwide. Says the trade, "The studio is mobilizing a sequel for Carell to return as Maxwell Smart." I was disappointed with the movie (which never seemed quite sure of its own comic premise: was Smart overconfident and inept or was he a good agent, but misunderstood?), but I liked the cast and if they all come back, perhaps the second time will be the charm. The article doesn't mention anything about the involvement of Anne Hathaway or Alan Arkin, but of course this sequel is in its earliest stages. There was already a direct-to-DVD sequel of sorts, the spinoff movie Get Smart's Bruce and Lloyd Out of CONTROL.

Warner Announces Get Smart (2008) DVD

The Digital Bits report that Warner Bros. has announced a November 4 release date for single-disc, double-disc and Blu-Ray editions of the 2008 theatrical feature Get Smart starring Steve Carell as Maxwell Smart, Agent 86, the role originated on TV by Don Adams. The Bits have the different artwork for all three versions, and DVDActive have higher-res versions, plus back cover art. They use the art from the teaser and final one-sheet theatrical posters, which was good art. Unfortunately, they muck it up with a big flippy banner at the bottom corner promising "62% More Laughs." These extra laughs appear to come from additional takes with different jokes, which can be viewed in "comedy optimization mode," apparently showing viewers different takes as they watch the movie. After a year that's seen the release of every single previous incarnation of Get Smart, this one makes roughly the billionth Smart DVD released this year.

Get Smart Complete Series DVD For The Masses!

Following HBO Home Video's bare bones release of Get Smart: Season 1 last month, TVShowsOnDVD has managed to confirm what The Digital Bits reported back in June: the twenty-five disc Get Smart - The Complete Series, "identical in box style and content (including all bonus material) to TimeLife's version," will be available from retailers in time for the holidays! The set (neatly housed in phone booth packaging) has been available for almost two years exclusively from TimeLife's website. It will still cost $199.95 (but for 138 episodes and over nine hours of bonus material, you get your money's worth), but consumers will now be able to benefit from the deep discounts frequently applied by popular online retailers like Amazon or DeepDiscount. Already anticipating this, TimeLife themselves are currently offering the set at a 25% discount with the coupon code "GETSMART."

New Spy DVDs Out This Week

After a summer of pretenders and imitations, the real Get Smart is finally available in stores today–and at a bargain price, no less! You can pick up Get Smart - Season 1, starring Don Adams and Barbara Feldon, for under twenty bucks at most retailers. The catch? This HBO Home Video release doesn’t include the bonus disc that accompanied the first season in TimeLife’s online-only version from 2006... nor can it compete with TimeLife’s awesome Complete Collection packaging. Still, it beats their price by a very wide margin. So Smart fans who haven’t already acquired the that set are left with a tough choice: are copious special features and a cool, gimmicky box worth an extra $100 or so? Would you believe... maybe?

Still, the new Season 1 release is not altogether featureless. Since it does include the exact same discs as the TimeLife version (just one fewer), it's still got Barbara Feldon introductions on every episode, and a commentary with Mel Brooks and Buck Henry on the awesome black and white pilot. (Spy fans will find this set worth buying for that pilot alone; its tone is surprisingly Avengersy, and The Wild Wild West's Michael Dunn plays a great villain named Mr. Big.)

New Spy DVDs Out Today

Get Smart's Bruce And Lloyd Out Of CONTROL

Another Tuesday, another Get Smart title that isn't the real Get Smart... Today's cash-in on the so-so theatrical movie is a neat concept, to be sure. It's not a sequel to the new movie, but a direct-to-DVD tie-in that takes place concurrently to the events in the film and stars two of its appealing supporting actors, Masi Oka and Nate Torrence, as hapless CONTROL techies Bruce and Lloyd. Get Smart's Bruce and Lloyd Out of CONTROL sees them trying to recover their stolen "invisibility cloak," and features cameos from some of the other actors in the movie, including one who makes a surprise cameo at the end of the theatrical film playing a beloved fixture of the series. Furthermore, it's written by the writers of the theatrical film, Matt Ember and Tom J. Astle. I'm intrigued enough by the concept to check it out.

Be aware that Best Buy is offering an exclusive two-disc edition. As far as I can tell, the only extras on the second disc are the first two episodes of the classic TV show, but that's a damn good extra if you don't already have them in the Time-Life collection! Also, it's got much better art (pictured) than the lame regular version!

Anglo Saxon Attitudes

Also out today, from Acorn Media, is that British miniseries I mentioned a few months ago, Anglo Saxon Attitudes. It's not a spy show at all, but it does star two very notable spy stars: Deadlier Than the Male's Bulldog Drummond Richard Johnson and that Daniel Craig guy (who I gather stars in some spy movies). This might be worth a watch for fans of those actors, although I suspect Craig's role (one of his first) is really much smaller than the misleading box cover would indicate.

The Real Get Smart Hits Stores In August

Get Smart: The Complete Collection (we're talking about the real Mel Brooks/Buck Henry Sixties classic here starring Don Adams, not any of the various pretenders) has been available for a year and a half as an exclusive from TimeLife, but the plan all along was that TimeLife's window of exclusivity would last just a year. After that, HBO Home Video would have the right to distribute the classic series in stores. And now, finally, they've decided to exercise that right. According to TVShowsOnDVD, the first season, containing all thirty episodes including the fantastic pilot, "Mr. Big" (the only black and white episode) will hit stores on August 5, 2008. No retail price or list of extras has been released, but TVShowsOnDVD cautions that HBO's press release lists the set as being four discs, whereas TimeLife's Season 1 was five discs, so it looks like the bonus disc (chock-full of extras) will be omitted. For more details on this and other disturbing discrepancies, head on over there. No matter what the release includes, however, it's good news for spy fans who don't have deep pockets that there will be an alternative to TimeLife's expensive set!

New Spy DVDs Out This Week

Sorry I'm a day late with this one. Tuesday, June 3, was supposed to be a really big (and pricey) day for spy DVD releases, but the previously reported special editions of the '67 and '06 versions of Casino Royale that were set to street this week have both been put off until the fall, as I had predicted would happen. What are we left with? Well, we still get the complete series (all seven episodes!) of Fox's 1995 revival of Get Smart. The box art tries its best to deceive potential buyers into thinking they're getting the original Don Adams series, but beware: despite the DVD cover, Adams and Barbara Feldon are supporting players to star Andy Dick (playing their son) in this version of the show. I haven't seen any episodes, but Get Smart '95 doesn't have a good reputation. Still, it does have Don Adams as Maxwell Smart, so surely that puts it a step ahead of the new theatrical feature? And certainly makes it essential for Smart completists... especially at just $10.99 on Amazon.

Get Smart Again

I've seen Get Smart and I know it's bad, but Warners' marketing team have done such a good job with their ad campaign that I can't help get excited for it anyway. The trailers have all been great, and I really like the posters and billboards as well. Maybe I'm reading too much into them, but to me the posters with the four leads crammed together, each somehow obscuring each others' faces, is a clever parody of commonplace modern movie posters, where disembodied heads are haphazardly crammed together in a bad Photoshop montage, and might as well be blocking each other for all the thought that seems to have gone into the placement. If only the movie commented so cleverly on... anything!

Well, perhaps the direct-to-DVD spinoff, arriving at the same time as the feature, will fare better. The trailer's up now for Get Smart's Bruce and Lloyd Out of Control, which follows two CONTROL techies with small roles in the theatrical film in events that transpire simultaneously to Maxwell Smart's adventure. (Unfortunately, based on the DVD's awful cover, they don't seem to have the same graphic design team working on the spinoff!)