Melissa McCarthy takes Spy to the next level

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      Starring Melissa McCarthy. Rated 14A.

      To appreciate the warped genius of Melissa McCarthy, consider what she can do with a truly hideous cupcake necklace. It’s the inappropriate thank-you gift her desk-bound CIA agent receives from a Bond-like Jude Law, and her reaction is a gut-splitting mix of feigned gratitude and genuine horror.

      In anyone else’s hands it probably wouldn’t be half as funny, and the same goes for Spy. Yes, it’s yet another 007 parody, but the new queen of comedy raises it to another level—and she brings out the fearlessness in the rest of the all-star cast. McCarthy doesn’t care if she looks stupid, whether she’s grinning with lipstick smeared over her teeth or taking on secret cat-lady identities, complete with wigs that went out of style with Maude. (“I look like someone’s homophobic aunt.”)

      Beneath all the laughs, there’s a subversive little story of empowerment happening here. Her meek Susan Cooper is relegated to the mouse-infested basement at Langley headquarters, directing Law’s tux-wearing CIA spy through his earpiece. But when he goes off the grid, she’s sent undercover to the exotic locales of Paris, Rome, and Budapest to nab an illegal nuke and bring down sadistic femme fatale Rayna (a magnificently coiffed Rose Byrne).

      As Susan finds her inner tiger, watch her hurl an increasingly hilarious litany of abuse at her tormenters, including Jason Statham’s pseudo-tough agent and Peter Serafinowicz’s creepily “handsy” Italian spook.

      Bridesmaids director Paul Feig has blown the bank here, globe-hopping and gamely pushing the envelope on the gore quotient. It gets long, and we could do with one or two fewer helicopter and car chases. McCarthy doesn’t need fancy stuff: she could make cat T-shirts and pinkeye funny. Actually, she does.

      Follow Janet Smith on Twitter @janetsmitharts.

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