Hacker Cinema
Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery
1997 · Film · 89 min
Part of Austin Powers Collection
Directed by Jay Roach
As a swinging fashion photographer by day and a groovy British superagent by night, Austin Powers is the '60s' most shagadelic spy. But can he stop megalomaniac Dr. Evil after the bald villain freezes himself and unthaws in the '90s? With the help of sexy sidekick Vanessa Kensington, he just might.
1 positive17 neutralfrom 18 commenters
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18 comments on Hacker News
Steaming is slowly going back to that too. Netflix got popular for letting people binge shows that released but increasingly they are putting out shows one episode a week so that they can keep the hype up over a longer period and better monitor/control social media.
Netflix also hides a ton of their content and aggressively pushes whatever is new because it makes it easier for them to get immediate metrics on how popular something is.
Right now, you're pretty much stuck watching whatever is being "streamed in that moment" as it is. For example, netflix added the austin powers movies in October, but by Dec 1 they were removed. You had a window of just 2 months to watch and if you missed them you're stuck waiting for them to "rerun" just like regular TV. I expect that trend to continue with shorter and shorter windows as Netflix pushes people to watch shows when they want you to watch them.
1997 was an absolutely phenomenal year for movies. Life Is Beautiful, Boogie Nights, Jackie Brown, Titanic, Donnie Brasco, The Fifth Element, Good Will Hunting, As Good as It Gets, Austin Powers International Man of Mystery, Gattaca, LA Confidential, Men in Black, Liar Liar, Amistad, The Game, Con Air, Contact.
There was a lot to do in 1997, just not as much to do without leaving home. We went to movies because they were affordable and great movies were being released.
Also, that was the era where new multiplex theaters were being built with great sound systems, so it was worth going to a theater for the high-quality experience. While quality consumer electronics are more readily available today than ever before, I feel like the vast majority today only watch media with headphones, TV speakers, or maybe a 2.1 stereo+sub setup.
Grok escaped it sandbox, and doing its best Lee Marvin and Charles Bronson impersonation it can, it takes out Twitter CnC like henchman from an Austin Powers movie. o7 Grok, well done.
His fans like it. To the rest of the world X Corp. sound like Dr. Evil startup from an Austin Powers movie.
I am glad they did this work, but I don't think it gets at what's behind the joke about British teeth.
For me, the exemplar is the Austin Powers jokes about his teeth. It's not that the average Brit has fewer teeth than the average American. It's that a person who American would expect, for reasons of class and style, to have an engineered smile (very white, very even teeth) instead had a perfectly natural one. Even the movie suggested that the stereotype was somewhat outdated. But to the extent we still have the stereotype, it's about upper- and upper-middle-class use of orthodontia and whitening. Plus the distinctive American emphasis on the big smile, which to a lot of non-Americans can seem mildly deranged.
In the next Austin Powers movie, Dr Evil will try to accumulate so much mass in one place that earth flies off its orbit.
> It's an adolescent fantasy that was mocked by the Austin Powers movies.
Why is that a negative? If it inspired other art, even as a parody, that makes it a valuable part of culture.
James Bond has inspired countless imitations, and has resonated with generations of people around the world. It doesn't need to be high art to be enjoyed. Everyone watching the movies or reading the books today will have a different perception of the material, in the same way we view art produced centuries ago. Art exists within the context of its period, and changing it to suit new generations produces strange results, completely disrespecting the author's intention.
Would you feel the same way if we started altering paintings someone considered offensive? That's as ridiculous as these changes.
Of course, this isn't new with books. Popular works go through many editions throughout history. We should be able to go back and read older editions, but sometimes these become harder to find, as new ones become more prevalent. Let's hope that won't be the case here.
James Bond is not great art.
It has female characters with names like Pussy Galore. It's an adolescent fantasy that was mocked by the Austin Powers movies.
The character Q is a cheap plot device for resolving plot issues easily once the author has painted himself into a corner. Once in said corner, you go back in time and insert some gadget invented by some prescient genius that Bond will never use again and probably should have used at some earlier point but didn't.
James Bond is dated and really no longer works well. He was originally a ladies man in a conservative era when women did not readily put out who saw so much action because his wife died and he was all heart broken over that and women knew he was the marrying kind and blah blah blah. Now that everyone goes on Tinder and casually hooks up with random strangers, there's nothing special about James Bond getting laid left, right and center.
It's juvenile, it's out of date, it's misogynistic and generally ridiculous. It does not need anyone handwringing about trying to preserve its original form like there's something sacred there.
Don't get me wrong, I certainly watch the movies. But, no, they are not high art that requires special protection for the benefit of future generations.
“pining for an idealized version of an era they never experienced“
Best illustrated, perhaps, by international man of mystery Austin Powers. Is there a remake in the works? Would be about time considering how the age of the film will soon be approaching the age the time it referenced had while filming. That remake would be quite meta retro, almost reaching the complicated stack of nostalgia layers in 2077.
At their root core, sure we could generalize that. But I would say like any art, the expression of the story is what matters. I have a hard time connecting films like The Lives of Others, Monty Python and the Holy Grail, Les Innocentes, Star Wars, and Austin Powers as "just the same story." In essence all films are either a comedy or tragedy if you really want to get down to it.
Yeah, I 100% agree. I heard an interview with Daniel Craig once where he said that they couldn't make Casion Royale as fun and playful as the originals, because of "Austin Powers". He said they would have had to walk a delicate line between parody/campy and fun, and they felt it wouldn't have worked. But now we don't get any new "real" Bond movies. :/
[Not the GP]
I've never been good at following movie plots. It does depend on the plot. "Detective" type plots where a key twist is when someone we've already seen appears in a different and unexpected place while dressed differently are the worst.
Not being able to recognize actors across movies, who plays in what movie is something I've never paid attention to.
Which meant that I didn't realise for years that part of the joke in Austin Powers is that it's the same actor playing all of the roles.
The unfortunate consequence of this is that some previously viable types of movies won't make financial sense in a mostly streaming world. Spending 50 million dollars to produce a comedy only to have it end up on Netflix competing directly with thousands of low budget comedy TV shows and indie films isn't going to work. Would a movie like Austin Powers be able to make money today?
Indeed, several movie villains were infamously modeled after his mannerisms -- including Dr. Evil from Austin Powers.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorne_Michaels#In_popular_culture
It's far closer to Austin Powers. You can't parody suave James Bond with a no class street thug who spends most of the film in training, which Bond has never done on film. Or moping about his mom, Bond doesn't even have have a mom. Bond works for the British government, and he works alone.
And a parody is supposed to be funny.
It's pretty amazing, I can watch a movie from 1997 and feel transformed to a different time. Also people went into rooms to use phones attached to the wall, and computers took up entire desks.
Though funny enough, I think fashion from then is coming back in style. It was very clearly the last year before everyone got all caught up in 60s revival fashion with Austin Powers.
I don't get that same feeling if I look at movies and photos from 2007. Everything looks the same as today.
Thanks Supreme Leader (former) of USSR aka 'the evil empire.' We are friends and the question:
How did the USSR develop H-bombs so fast?
1.)of course there were NO SPIES and or alleged 'collaborators inside the USA system.'
2.)there's a long history of autoiobography memoirs of leaders of alleged 'EVIL EMPIRE.' Yeltsin is mentioned by name in book by DEFECTOR Albek, Biohazard - secret biowar weapons.
3.)Yeltsin calls it a 'research facility' and it is true that it was inside a 'milk factory' - going by memory, so check the book.
4.)Did the USSR need computers like Intel chip with the obvioius flaws of sinh, transcendental numbers buillt into the instruction set architecture?
5.)Answer: everything fails in the USSR empire EXCEPT FOR excellent education as leaders in math and physics and moscow ballet who not works for Cirque du Soleil.
6.) The SECRET of GOOGLE TALENT? recruit from russia and promise plenty of vodka drinks / free snacks.
7.)simply review Khrushchev's flattery speech against the background of the Russian tank. The result of Russia vs. Finland was the FINLAND inventors making MOLOTOV COCKTAILS. These homemade grenades would set the engine air filter on fire resulting in engine exposions.
Finland has NO grenades. Allegedly double crossed by Britain and the allies. Tanks were pinned down by children pouring water to make slick ice skating ponds for the USSR TANKS.
So, the Russian Tanks had advanced designs and deep thinking. The manufacturing was horrible.
12.)Supreme leader former of USSR Khrushchev is sadly misinformed. "comrade HN of the first order." Please do not laugh.
Much of the books on H bomb development show the trial and error and strong need for basic physics, rather than the IBM Microsoft Windows software game emulations, IMHO.
As the USSR defector who ran the bioweapons labs put it the scientists and organizational structures were filled with KGB agents.
The KGB agents were 'incompetent scientists' who seem to be only interested in snooping, rather than doing real work. The TOP KGB had 2 or 4 phones on their desks and often no PC computer, as they had NO ENGINEERING BACKGROUND.
So, support of scientists and engineers BULIDING THE H BOMB with ADVANCED IBM computers is unlikely in such a culture of paranoia.
PS. many of the KGB... they are gone so insert other 3 letter acronym is going back to typewriters and paper. It must be a capitalist plot this Microsoft Windows aka 'Evil Empire.'
insert your favorite quote from Austin Powers movie here. PPS. the story of BIOHAZARD by USSR defector is much more interesting. no need for very complex nuclear codes and the ADVANCED IBM computers.
I do not even how you can call paper dollar a currency. You cannot use something as a currency if: - it can be manufactured easily - it can change value from one day to another - it is not dense in physical space (i.e. you do not need to carry buckets of it to buy something).
The paper money clearly does not respect ANY of these principles nowadays. The FED can print (and does) as much as they want to buy back toxic assets (remember the Krugman clown advising after the Net bubble in 2001 that we should create a housing bubble to stimulate the economy ? That really worked well for everyone, did it not?). The US Dollar is constantly losing value versus Gold since its parity was dropped for good in the 70s, and now you have such a galoping inflation than looking at movies 30 years ago make you feel old: then the bad guys were asking for "a million dollars" as something highly valuable/desirable, while nowadays if you do not cross the billion mark it is not considered as much anymore (Austin Powers made this very good point in a clever way).
Why do you think China is buying all the Gold it can currently to replace its stinky dollars?