It's Awful, Baby, Yeah!

Seth Green makes a particularly grim return as Dr. Evil's troubled teen son, Scott Evil. (Daddy doesn't love him because Scott is "the margarine of evil ... the Diet Coke of evil. Just one calorie, not quite evil enough.") Except for a briefly funny opening sequence in which father and son appear on The Jerry Springer Show (and how 1997 is that?), Scott spends the rest of the movie sneering at Dad, calling him an "ass" and an "idiot." And he doesn't look as though he's kidding, either; he spits the words at him. Is that Scott talking to Dr. Evil, or Green speaking to Myers? Green is either a very good actor, or he isn't acting.

Elizabeth Hurley (conveniently excised from the movie during its opening sequence), Robert Wagner, Michael York, Will Ferrell, and Mindy Sterling also reprise their roles from International Man of Mystery: same actors, same jokes. Even Burt Bacharach is back for a musical number with Elvis Costello, who evidently got the gig because he provided the model for Austin's teeth. Willie Nelson and Woody Harrelson also appear as the punch lines to an extended dick joke (pardon the pun) that's repeated twice.

The movie ends with Dr. Evil promising to return and "get" Austin Powers, and an unhappier ending is hard to imagine. Fact is Shagged Me runs almost two hours and feels twice as long; imagine Schindler's List, just not as funny. At last week's screening, a boy about of about eight years who should at least have appreciated the bathroom humor, asked, "Is it over yet?" a good ten minutes before the final credits.

Let's see. The first Austin Powers cost $16 million and grossed $54 million in theaters. The second cost a reported $30 million and probably has already made close to that from product tie-ins. Don't get your hopes up, kid.

Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me
Directed by Jay Roach. Written by Mike Myers and Michael McCullers. Starring Myers, Heather Graham, Michael York, Rob Lowe, Mindy Sterling, and Verne Troyer.