Get Smart is like watching your favorite rock band play an awesome concert. Awesome, that is, when they aren’t championing causes between every song. Your experience isn’t ruined but you think maybe you paid too much to hear musicians talk. Get Smart is a hilarious spy parody when it isn’t shooting comic blanks at a Lame Duck.

Smart (Steve Carell) is a star analyst for CONTROL, a U.S. intelligence agency created during the Cold War to fight KAOS. He longs to be James Bond. In his 40s, he’s well past the average age of a field agent. He is depressed that it may never happen until his agency is attacked by its nemesis. The chief of CONTROL (Alan Arkin) explains how all of its field agents have had their identities revealed. It’s up to Smart as Agent 86 to infiltrate KAOS, which has been stockpiling nuclear weapons. A total klutz, he gets help from Agent 99 (Anne Hathaway), a no-nonsense agent unhappy being saddled with a walking liability.

Get Smart feels mostly like the '60s television show it’s based on. Before the Austin Powers movies, the original Get Smart spoofed James Bond. The remake also pokes fun at silly gadgets, inept bad guys, and hideouts in weird locations. For instance after the sneak attack, CONTROL moves to its backup headquarters. It’s hidden in the middle of a fountain in front of the Lincoln Memorial. Seven-foot-two WWE wrestler The Great Kali plays a Jaws-like henchman who seems impossible to kill.

The movie is hilarious every time Carell is onscreen. Purists will claim that Carell’s Smart isn’t a complete doofus. On the show, Smart beat the bad guys through sheer dumb luck. But Carell nails him enough whether Smart’s harpooning himself with a crossbow or knocking himself out with sleeping gas. Carell’s deadpan acting and sweetness makes his character likable.

I liked the jocks vs. nerds rivalry in the CONTROL office. But the theme also fuels some irritating George Bush jokes. The writers hammer these into the plot rather than shape them into Bond send-ups. America’s secret agents are dumb brutes who couldn’t find a bomb in a swimming pool. James Caan is the president who can’t pronounce the word nuclear. Isn’t it a sign your material is old when it’s used in advertisements to sell cable TV?

Minus the carelessly dull political satire, Get Smart’s still a decent summer film with a mix of James Bond-level action and laughs. Anne Hathaway’s Agent 99 is tough and sexy. She and Carell make a great odd couple. The Rock, Terry Crews, and David Koechner are also funny even though they’re playing essentially extended cameos. Get Smart’s real cameo is Bill Murray as Agent 13 stationed in a tree. It’s the silliest scene in the whole movie and extra goofiness is what the movie’s missing. The TV show was outrageous for spoofing spy movies harder than anyone. For the sequel, they need to make Bush a renegade ex-U.S president with a hidden base. I know a certain segment of movie fans would get a kick seeing the Bush Library built on an island in the middle of nowhere.

Grade: B-