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Mystery Men doesn't have much of a plot and some of the acting
is a bit wooden, but overall it is a pretty funny spoof on the
whole comic book super hero genre.
The story is set in Champion City which, like Gotham City and
Metropolis, has the misfortune to be crawling with a vast array
of super villains. Luckily, it also has its fair share of super
heroes although they are mostly spectacularly incompetent. The
only really effective super hero in town is Captain Amazing
(Greg Kinnear) who is losing his sponsorship deals because he
is running out of high profile bad guys to fight. A botched
attempt to increase his profile leaves him in the clutches of
the evil 1970s villain Casanova Frankenstein (Geoffrey Rush
with an excutiatingly bad accent).
It is up to Champion City's second tier super heroes to use
their dubious super powers to try and save Captain Amazing.
The core team is made up of Mr Furious (Ben Stiller, who gets
REALLY angry if provoked), The Shoveller (William H. Macy, who
hits people with a spade), and the Blue Raja (Hank Azaria, who
throws cutlery). To boost their numbers for the upcoming battle,
they manage to enlist additional caped wannabes The Spleen (Paul
Reubens, who can let rip suffocating wind if someone pulls his
finger), Invisible Boy (Kel Mitchell, who can only go invisible
if nobody is watching), the Bowler (Janeane Garafalo who, um,
bowls), and the terribly mysterious Sphinx (Wes Studi, who inspires
the team with deep proverbs like 'You must be like wolf pack,
not six pack).
There isn't much to the story line other than this motley band
getting ready to take on Casanova and his evil gang, other than
Mr Furious falling for Clare Forlani's sarcastic waitress. The
real fun in this movie is just laughing at the sheer ineptness
of both super heroes and super villains (the evil gang includes
the hilariously camp Disco Boys). The movie pokes fun at the
whole comic book super hero genre. If you are not familiar with
this world then walk along any shelf in a comic store and see
for yourself the mind boggling array of super heroes that exist,
many with powers only slightly less bizarre than the ones in
this movie. The ultimate spoof joke is when Mr Furious and The
Shoveller debate whether Captain Amazing's secret identity is
none other than billionaire Lance Hutton, but eventually decide
that this is impossible because Lance wears glasses and Captain
Amazing doesn't.
If you enjoyed the 60s TV series Batman, then you'll like Mystery
Men. Generally pretty funny stuff.
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