Spies in Disguise

Directors: Troy Quane & Nick Bruno
Release date: December 4, 2019
Rating: ★★★
Review:

In the opening scenes of ‘Spies in Disguise’ we are introduced to young boy Walter Beckett, the son of a single mom, who’s a police officer. Walter is a ‘weirdo’ to his class mates, but secretly a genius, inventing all kinds of surprisingly peaceful weapons for his mom. Fourteen years later, he has found employment at ‘H.T.U.V.’, a non-existing American spy agency, as one of the inventors cooking up new weaponry for the organization’s spies.

Superstar among these spies is Lance Sterling. Voiced by Will Smith, Sterling is a black version of James Bond: clear-headed, cool and on the cocky side. But things quickly turn against him, when an unknown villain takes his identity, and Sterling becomes hunted by his own agency. To redeem his name, he unwillingly has to team up with Walter and his pacifist weaponry, which includes a very unlikely transformation of the hero…

‘Spies in Disguise’ was adapted from the 2009 animated short ‘Pigeon: Impossible’ and is for the most part standard spy fare, taking place in faraway places like Mexico and Venice. The buddy theme is also tried material, and there are the obligate scenes of almost every American animated feature film of the era, like the obligate breakup scene, and a ‘all hope is lost’ moment. No, the most original aspect of ‘Spies in Disguise’ lies in its strong pacifist theme. As Walter puts it: “when you fight fire with fire, we all get burned”. Even the villain, who certainly meant the worst, is spared in the end.

Artistically the film remains on safe grounds. The human designs are dull and uninspired. For example, Walter is yet another variation on ‘the clumsy young man’ design, akin to Linguini in ‘Ratatouille’ (2007) or Johnny Loughran in ‘Hotel Transylvania’ (2012), while Lance Sterling is too clearly modelled on Smith’s coolest film roles, like that of agent J in ‘Men in Black’ (1997). The rest of the designs are on the angular side, without ever venturing into bold stylization. The color palette is perhaps the most interesting aspect of the film.

Unfortunately, Blue Sky wasn’t allowed to show if it could venture into more exciting territories, because ‘Spies in Disguise’ was the last feature film by the ill-fated animation studio. When Disney bought 20th Century Fox in March 2019 it acquired the animation studio with it. Of course, Disney had no use for yet another animation studio, and thus ‘Blue Sky’ was closed in 2021, officially due to the consequences of the covid pandemic…

Watch the first trailer of ‘Spies in Disguise’ yourself and tell me what you think: