The Man Who Knew Too Little

Starring: Bill Murray, Peter Gallagher
Directed by: Jon Amiel
Released: Warner Brothers, 1997

If you were going to pick somebody to play a man who knew too little, Bill Murray would be the actor for the job. Murray's talent for making the most of nothing is just the ticket for Jon Amiel (Copycat)'s spy comedy, as he takes a rather tepid Robert Farrar and Howard Franklin script (based on Farrar's novel) and makes it an enjoyable affair. Partially borrowing its title from Hitchock's 1956 thriller The Man Who Knew Too Much, this one takes things in the opposite direction -- Murray, an American vacationing in the U.K., unwittingly enters the world of international espionage, believing it to be a game. His subsequent encounters with a host of risible James Bond reject villains provide most of the movie's laughs. It's not a heavyweight comedy, but taken with a grain of salt, The Man Who Knew Too Little can be a lot of fun.