Story
The fourth movie in the Spy Kids series revolves around Marissa Wilson (Jessica Alba), a former OSS (Office of Strategic Services) spy, and her life since leaving the American intelligence agency. For the past few years, Marissa has spent most of her time caring for her baby daughter (Belle Solorzano). She also looks after Rebecca (Rowan Blanchard) and Cecil (Mason Cook), who are older children from her husband Wilbur’s (Joel McHale) previous marriage. Marissa tries really hard, but Rebecca keeps reminding her that she’ll never measure up to Rebecca’s dead biological mother.
Marissa’s life changes when she’s unexpectedly called back to work as a spy. Danger D’Amo (Jeremy Piven), head of the OSS, asks her to find and stop the evil genius known as the ‘Timekeeper’ (also played by Jeremy Piven). This villain and his sidekick, ‘Tick Tock’, are plotting to end the world by changing the passage of time. When Marissa gets back to the OSS, she teams up with the original Spy Kids operatives, Carmen Cortez (Alexa Vega) and her brother Juni (Daryl Sabara).
At first, Marissa hopes to keep her OSS involvement secret from her family, who have no idea about her past life as a spy. But her mission becomes more complicated when the Timekeeper’s henchmen threaten Rebecca and Cecil. Marissa is then forced to reveal her real identity to the children and, finally, to her husband. As events move towards a final battle, the entire family – including their dog, Argonaut (voiced by Ricky Gervais) – is drawn into her quest to stop the Timekeeper.
Themes
Family relationship problems; espionage; Armageddon
Violence
This movie includes repeated physical violence. Some of it is directed at and done by the children. For example: There’s also some verbal violence and verbal descriptions of violence in the movie. For example:
Sexual references
There are some mild sexual references in this movie. For example, when Argonaut the dog sees Carmen Cortez for the first time in several years, he says suggestively, ‘Well, hel-lo! You are bigger now’.
Alcohol, drugs and other substances
None of concern
Nudity and sexual activity
This movie doesn’t show any nudity directly, but both Marissa and Carmen often wear very tight, figure-hugging clothes.
The movie doesn’t show any sexual activity directly either. But it does include scenes where Marissa and Wilbur kiss and cuddle. At the end of the movie, they share a long, passionate kiss.
Product placement
Some products are displayed or used in this movie. They include Apple computers, Mercedes Benz cars and the YouTube website.
Also, characters talk about musician MC Hammer, earlier Spy Kids movies and James Bond movies. There are also many musical references to James Bond movies.
Coarse language
This movie includes some mild coarse and threatening language and several put-downs. In addition, there are several jokes involving wee, poo, farting and vomit.
Ideas to discuss with your children
Spy Kids: All the Time in the World is a fast-paced children’s science fiction action movie that uses a range of clever special effects.
Its main message is about the importance of fixing damaged family relationships while you still can. The movie also emphasises that it’s important to balance your life and work commitments to make sure you spend enough time with the people you love. On the other hand, the movie includes lots of violence, which sends the message that the best way to sort out conflict is aggression and force. This negative message undermines the positive ones.
Values in this movie that you could reinforce with your children include teamwork, honesty, patience and courage.
This movie could give you the chance to talk with your children about the bad things that can happen when you use violence. You could also talk about better ways to sort out problems.