Jim Lane

23 May 2012

... a shiny, complicated toy that's silly and doesn't really do anything, but is fun to play with.

derek-511

23 May 2012

The children really enjoyed this

We saw this as the initial part of a birthday party as it was on atKids Club. So with eight children in tow we went in to watch the filmin 2D and notionally using 35m film stock and also with the cards.The plot is the usual formula, black and white, good and bad with theone in between who needs redemption but the action scenes are good andthe smells gave the children the chance to say "what a pong" or similareven though the smells were not that different. At least it was anattempt at seeing whether you looked it or not, just like whether youlike 3D or not.There is no need for much plot enlargement as other reviews give mostof it away but my wife said that she would want to get this on DVD assoon as we came out of the cinema so it must have been good.

Nell Minow

23 May 2012

The gadgets are a lot of fun, including a robot dog with more functions than a Swiss Army Knife, hilariously voiced by Ricky Gervais.

FlashCallahan

23 May 2012

Tick Tock.....

This film is aimed squarely at kids. The whole franchise has, straightfrom the word go.And while this film does stink to high heaven, my daughter loved it andlaughed all the way through. Thats why i wanted to see it, to entertainmy daughter, and it did it's job.Rodriguez makes great quality movies for adults, look at hisfilmography for the evidence, when it comes to kids movies, he goeseven more over the top than he does in his normal movies.This is why i cannot stand all the hate, In 'once upon a time inMexico', Depp has his eyes taken out. In 'machete' Trejo chops 3 guysheads off at once. In 'desperad' there is a guy with a rocket launcher.So whats the big deal with this.The acting isn't very good, but i've never liked Alba for her Thespianskills, and the rest of the cast are just fodder.The story is okay, and the inclusion of Gervais as the talking dog ispainful, even he sounds embarrassed.So why the film is bad, i'm sure the auteur was not making it forpeople above twelve.

Brian Gibson

21 May 2012

A nice mix of old-fashioned imagination (anagrams, pranks, secret spaces) and newfangled effects (gizmos, gadgets, graphics), it's a rollicking, never obnoxious family flick.

kjm92

20 May 2012

Its a kids movie after all...

I don't think this was a bad film, granted it wasn't a good film butfor me I couldn't help relate it back to the original movies and inthat sense I think it did well, it didn't stray too far from theoriginal plot lines and I liked that because I was afraid after allthese years it would have changed completely.So many of these reviews rate it as "cheep and crappy", well it'sdefinitely cheap, the graphics are pretty much exactly the same as theoriginal films and its not going to win any awards for being abrilliant flick but the movie wasn't made for YOU, it was made for thekids.I think as a kids movie, or family movie, it does well and I believethe children will love it just as I loved the originals when I wasyounger. Yes the plot is cliché and predictable but to a kid it's awhole other world where they can be a hero without growing up.

Todd McCarthy

16 May 2012

Life is too short for Spy Kids: All the Time in the World in 4D.

Linda Barnard

16 May 2012

A pleasant time-waster kids will love with a pro-family togetherness message parents can appreciate...

Alison Willmore

15 May 2012

Rodriguez's family franchise about underage secret agents limps into its fourth installment with shiny CGI and frequent fart jokes to hold the attention spans of the underage and undemanding.

Anthony Quinn

15 May 2012

The mind boggles before being lulled into a stupor of inanition by this latest instalment of Robert Rodriguez's increasingly cheap-looking franchise.

Badou_Boy

13 May 2012

The worst film of 2011.

In a year full of films like "Transformers 3", "Video Girl","Colombiana" and "Abduction", choosing an official least favorite canbe pretty difficult, but that was before I watched Robert Rodriguez'sunfortunate atrocity known as "Spy Kids 4". Rodriguez was never a greatfilmmaker; his movies succeed on the basic levels of entertainment, buthe's never made a truly great film. By the way, I'm not a "Sin City"fan either. The previous "Spy Kids" movies were nothing special intheir own right, but I recall the first two being not bad, while the3rd one was more like "The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl";another Rodriguez atrocity. It's hard to say whether or not this filmis as bad, but it's certainly a piece of crap and I never want to sitthrough another "Spy Kids" film ever again. Does that mean Rodriguezwill stop making them? Of course not. Rodriguez has always been a sellout. He debuted with a strong piece of work called "El Mariachi", butthen he sold his soul to Hollywood by remaking the film into"Desperado", which had none of the charm or ingenuity of itspredecessor, and instead went for a more mainstream/blockbusterapproach. It wasn't bad, but it was definitely a disappointmentcompared to what came before it."Spy Kids 4" is simply awful. I felt extremely embarrassed whilewatching it and it could barely hold my attention throughout. This isone of the few films I've seen this year that was a real chore to getthrough, and I can't even say that about "Abduction", so you KNOW thisis bad. If you thought "Batman and Robin" had some of the worst punsimaginable, you haven't seen this film; except they're not even bad ona laughable level, they're just plain stupid. Rodriguez wrote thescript himself and did a terrible job on it; he just can't write kidfilms, let alone entertaining ones. There's nothing in the film to setit apart from previous entries and it has the standard barebones plotand unconvincing special effects that you'd expect. In fact, thespecial effects in this entry are even less convincing than the ones inthe previous films, oddly enough.The villains are bland, the twist is predictable, the music is annoyingand the acting is overall poor. The two child actors did a better jobthan the adult actors, but they were still excruciating to listen to,and the action scenes are so bad that I felt like ramming my own headin with a hammer while viewing them, which I probably should've done tosave myself from having to review this garbage. Well, at least I cantruly name the worst film of the year that I've seen, as I would'vedone a disservice to all the other terrible movies that have come outthis year by not giving my thoughts on this amazing accomplishment ofawfulness. "Spy Kids 4" literally has no redeeming values whatsoever;Robert Rodriguez has once again hit an all time low.

KingFarticus

13 May 2012

just beyond garbage.

I hate it when they have a good series going and then 10 years laterthey ruin it with all loads of different actors and an entirelydifferent plot.Well if thats what you feel like then don't go see thisfilm.Even the 4D is garbage!So i give this film a 3.5 stars out of10.Spy Kids 1,2,3 were good,nothing wrong with them but if you don'tlike cheesy movies then your in for a waste for 10$ tickets.Yep SpyKids had returning main stars but they weren't great.Like Danny Trejoonly had like a half a cameo because all he did was freeze and hedidn't make any noise.Antonio Banderas was supposed to have asupporting role but they cut him out. FINAL WORDS:NO GOOD

Brian Orndorf

11 May 2012

Unless the thought of smelling farts and blue cheese is appealing, I wouldn't bother touching the cards.

Keith Staskiewicz

11 May 2012

Would have been better titled Spy Kids: All the Time Puns in the World.

DarkVulcan29

11 May 2012

Not bad, but please be more original.

Writer, director Robert Rodriguez, seems to like to entertain kids, orhe's just bored, reviving a franchise that does need to be. Now I wasentertained by the first two Spy Kids movies, but the third one was ripoff of Tron(1982).Jessica Alba is amusing in her role, as a retired spy, wanting tobecome stepmother to her husbands(Joel McHale The Soup)kids, and havingone of her own. But then an old enemy comes back in the picture, andshe is called back into action. But will her husbands kids become thenew spy kids?The two original spy kids make an appearance, they are Alexa Vega andDaryl Sabara, and you know they are not kids anymore. But that was abig problem for me, cause I feel the films focus went more on them, andless on the new spy kids, it was like the new generation was making anappearance in there own movie. Jessica Alba was good, so was JoelMchale. But they where convincing as a couple, now Antonio Banderas andCarla Gugino was more convincing. But all in all an amusing film, hadinteresting effects. But go in this movie knowing, what too expect.

dtucker86

10 May 2012

Pants poopingly awful?

That was the byline for a previous review of this film. I want tocommend the author for his fine way with words. Actually, this is agood family film that children should love. After all, the kids in themovie get to outsmart adults and save the world. When I was watchingthis, I was thinking of the late Desmond Llewelyn, he was the actor whoplayed Q the weapons officer in the early James Bond movies. I wonderedwhat he would think of the "gadgets" used here. This is the only spymovie I have ever seen where vomit, dirty diapers, and dog flatulenceare used as weapons. Oh my bad, I have to realize this is a kids movieand they have to be gross to pull in the youngsters. I had never seenany of the previous Spy Kids movies so have nothing to compare this to.I was just bored and had nothing to do and watching this film helpedpass the time, what a great recommendation for it! Seriously, the onepositive message in this film is that the two children learn to lovetheir stepmom and respect her when they didn't at first. This moviedeals with a villain tinkering with time, but there is a more importantmessage about time in it. The message is how important time with yourloved ones is. The dad in the movie realizes this. Maybe this issomething parents can discuss with their children after they watch themovie together.

Cath Clarke

10 May 2012

Sadly it's all fart jokes and smart-alec preteens - the stuff that can make taking kids to the pictures a chore.

Alonso Duralde

09 May 2012

Robert Rodriguez clobbers home his messages about family and quality time with such bludgeoning force that ushers should hand you a helmet to go with your 3-D glasses.

Stephen Schaefer

09 May 2012

It's rarely moving, hardly funny much less ever enthralling.

collipal-1

08 May 2012

An entertaining family film

I liked the films Spy Kids and Spy Kids 2: Island of Lost Dreams verymuch because they captured the tone and sensibility of the best familycinema, naughty and subversive but without falling into the vulgarityand without insulting the audience's intelligence. However, I found thethird film of the saga (Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over) stretched the concepttoo much and lost the focus on the character, making them lose anygrace. Now, the fourth film Spy Kids: All the Time in the World triedto resurrect the franchise with a new family of spies, some characterswe already knew and a potentially creative screenplay which did not endup being as ingenious as it could have been. The final result is anentertaining, but not very memorable family film, which is verysuperior to the third one of the saga, but very inferior to the firsttwo ones.The actors from Spy Kids: All the Time in the World make a good work intheir roles, starting by the kids Rowan Blanchard and Mason Cook, whoare likable and spontaneous. Jessica Alba and Joel McHale have a goodchemistry with each other, and also feel natural and credible, withoutexaggerating the humor moments nor forcing their emotions during theobligatory scenes of family conflict (Oh, no! The father works a lotand doesn't have any time to be with his sons! The kids miss theirbiological mom and resent the arrival of their father's new wife!). Igenerally don't like Alba's performances, but I have to admit she madea competent work in here. However, what I most liked in Spy Kids: Allthe Time in the World is the dog Argonaut, in part because of theanimal's charm and ability, and in part because of Ricky Gervais'energetic voice work.As for Robert Rodriguez's direction in here, it feels kinda impersonal;like if Spy Kids: All the Time in the World was only a clause in hiscontract with Dimension Films, or a quick source of funding for him tomake a movie in which he is more interested. Nevertheless, I had a goodtime while watching Spy Kids: All the Time in the World despite notbeing very memorable, and I can mainly give it a moderaterecommendation mainly as a casual entertainment to spend a pleasanttime with the whole family. But if you wanna see genuinely creativefamily cinema, I recommend you the first two films of this saga, or theunderrated Shorts, which was also directed by Rodriguez.