Mystery Men

Mystery Men is a 1999 American superhero comedy film directed by Kinka Usher (in his feature-length directorial debut), written by Neil Cuthbert, loosely based on Bob Burden's Flaming Carrot Comics, starring Ben Stiller, Hank Azaria, William H. Macy, Greg Kinnear, Claire Forlani, Kel Mitchell, Paul Reubens, Janeane Garofalo, Wes Studi, Geoffrey Rush, Lena Olin, Eddie Izzard, and Tom Waits. The film details the story of a team of lesser superheroes with unimpressive powers who are required to save the day from a criminal genius when Champion City's resident superhero gets captured. Mystery Men received generally positive reviews from critics, but was a box-office bomb, only making a little over $33 million worldwide against a $68 million budget. Plot In Champion City, the amateur superhero team of Mr. Furious, the Shoveler and the Blue Raja attempt to make a name for themselves, but their inexperience, infighting, and dubious abilities generally result in defeat and frustration. While trying to stop a robbery in progress, they are upstaged by the city's powerful and arrogant superhero, Captain Amazing. However, Amazing's crime fighting prowess has practically made his job obsolete. Without any worthy adversaries (most are either dead, in exile, or in jail), his corporate sponsors are beginning to withdraw support. To create a need for his services, Amazing uses his alter ego, billionaire lawyer Lance Hunt, to argue for the release of his nemesis, supervillain Casanova Frankenstein, from an insane asylum. However, the plan backfires; once released and reunited with his henchman Tony P and his Disco Boys, Casanova Frankenstein blows up the asylum, easily outwits and captures Amazing, and prepares to unleash the "Psycho-frakulator", which lethally bends reality, on the city.