Spy flick can’t cover all its targets
KEEPING UP WITH THE JONESES ★★ 1/2 out of 5 Starring: Zach Galifianakis, Isla Fisher, John Hamm, Gal Gadot Director: Greg Mottola Duration: 105 minutes
Tim and Natalie Jones (Jon Hamm and Gal Gadot) have it all: worldly sophistication, expensive wardrobes and legs for days. Next door, Jeff (Zach Galifianakis) and Karen (Isla Fisher) Gaffney are the squares trying to “keep up” in this Neighbors-meets-Spy comedy. They’ve just dropped the kids off at summer camp and find themselves twiddling their thumbs instead of being intimate.
Their boredom eventually leads to Karen’s spying on the Joneses. She sees past their dream lives — Tim’s travel writing and knowledge of multiple languages, Natalie’s exquisite Instagrams and charity work for Sri Lankan orphans — and questions why such impeccable specimens of the human race would live in a humble suburb.
As it turns out, the Joneses are undercover agents investigating an illegal trade at a top-secret aerospace company, where Jeff works as an HR manager. He naturally dismisses Karen’s suspicions, excited that someone as cool as Tim wants to be his friend,
When Karen reveals the Joneses’ secret identities, the Gaffneys are roped into their dangerous investigation: They dodge sniper lasers, try to buckle their seatbelts during car-chase shootouts, mediate torture interrogations and witness exploding houses.
In other words, they have the time of their lives, even as they play decoys when the Joneses rig a fake trade with “Scorpion,” the big bad who’s played by a surprise cameo best kept a secret — it’s a brilliant piece of commentary on the film’s theme of perfection versus mediocrity.
Fisher and Galifianakis are clearly modelled after Rose Byrne and Seth Rogen in Neighbors, but while that movie allows room for over-the-top reactions from its norms, here the director and screenwriter rely on the talents of Fisher and Galifianakis to transcend what’s on the page.
Occasionally the actors pull it off, especially when they’re bumbling around yelling at each other, but otherwise the Gaffneys are a little too dull. It’s easier to write mysterious, cypher-like characters, which is why the genetically blessed Hamm and Gadot seem so believably unbelievable. But when the two couples actually do become friends, and the reserved Tim finally opens up about his career dissatisfaction and the aloof Natalie loses her temper, the film again struggles to create a real pathos, especially with Gadot’s underwritten character.
And yet it’s easy to watch Keeping Up With the Joneses because the humour is consistent, minus a gaffe here and there. While it aims for easy laughs and thrills, like giving Fisher and Gadot’s characters more than one lesbian scene (how risqué!), the film tries to hit too many targets at once.
As a result, Keeping Up With the Joneses simply can’t keep up with the comedies it so clearly tries to imitate.