What's Up, Tiger Lily?

1966 action comedy

Rating: 11/20

Plot: Spies race to get their hands on a top secret egg salad sandwich recipe.

Despite this being the third time I've seen this movie now, the best thing I can say about it is that it, at times, is mildly amusing. Allen took a Japanese action spy flick and redubs it into this nonsensical egg salad plot. This starts out as a novel and fun little movie, but it quickly wears out its welcome and loses steam as it goes. There are some funny moments scattered throughout, but the execution definitely isn't as good as the original idea. A lot of the humor actually comes from admiring how terrifically awful the original movie would be on its own. Some of Allen's jokes are pretty funny in the same way his early stand-up and written work, always edging toward the absurd, is pretty funny. A lot of the humor probably worked a lot better in 1966 while a lot of it probably never worked at all. The bizarrely incongruous soundtrack and occasional live performances by The Lovin' Spoonful are kind of fun though. More fun than the meta-appearances that Woody makes anyway.