ACTION COMEDY; 1hr 43min
STARRING: Will Smith, Tommy Lee Jones, Josh Brolin, Jermaine Clement
Mission improbable: from left, Jones and Smith
Aliens of all freaky-deaky stripes are thick on the ground in the rollicking MIB 3. The chief worry is goggle-eyed Boris the Animal (Clement), with an arsenal of inbuilt nasties, the worst teeth in town and a terrible disposition. Having escaped from a lunar prison where saturnine Agent K (Jones) put him years ago after depriving him of an arm, Boris is back on Earth and trouble is a-brewing for chipper Agent J (Smith). To save both K and the global day, J must time-travel back to 1969 by leaping off the Chrysler Building, as you do, and putting paid to Boris before he can cause havoc. Once there (whew!), J connects with K’s surly younger self (Brolin, pitch-perfect a la Jones) and the two set out to rewrite history.
Who knew protecting the planet could be such a blast? The gizmos and effects are stupendous and director Barry Sonnenfeld, at the helm for the third time, makes the most of them throughout the all-or-nothing insanity. But this is a buddy movie, too, fuelled by the back and forth of the J-K marriage of opposites. They’re an A team to beat, in any decade.
