Agent Cody Banks is a 2003 American spy comedy film directed by Harald Zwart. It follows the adventures of the 15-year-old title character, played by Frankie Muniz, who has to finish his chores, avoid getting grounded, and save the world by going undercover for the CIA as a James Bond–type superspy. Hilary Duff, Angie Harmon, Keith David, Cynthia Stevenson, Daniel Roebuck, Darrell Hammond, Ian McShane, and Arnold Vosloo co-star. The movie was filmed in British Columbia and was released in the United States on March 14, 2003.

This film was the first major motion picture project for Duff apart from the film spinoff of her Lizzie McGuire TV series, as well as for Harmon, who had just come off a three-year stint as Assistant D.A. Abbie Carmichael on NBC s Law & Order. A sequel was released the following year. The film s executive producers include Madonna (whose then-production company Maverick Films acquired the script) and Jason Alexander (he was originally attached to direct before being replaced by Vic Armstrong, who was ultimately replaced by Zwart).

Plot

Cody Banks, a 15-year-old bullied high school junior in Seattle, applies for a junior field ops position at the Central Intelligence Agency s Special Activities Division after completing a training summer camp. Answering to his handler Agent Ronica Miles, Cody is called upon a mission to find information about a scientist named Dr. Albert Connors. Connors is employed by a SPECTRE-type organization named ERIS, led by Dr. Brinkman and his henchman François Molay. As every CIA officer is known to Brinkman s organization, the CIA uses the unknown Banks, who is placed into the prep school of Dr. Connors daughter Natalie, the William Donovan Institute.

Cody soon finds he has no social skill with girls and has no time to do this while balancing his chores and homework. The CIA decides to help by doing his chores and homework, trying to build his status, and going into the school to set him up with Natalie. The CIA also assemble a varying team of experts to train Cody into how to talk to girls, and issue him with a variety of gadgets with various functions.

Eventually, Cody befriends and falls in love with Natalie after rescuing her from falling off a ladder while putting up a banner, and he is invited to her 16th birthday party, where he goes undercover to her father s lab. Cody finds that Dr. Brinkman is planning to use nanobots — which can destroy any carbon or silicon-based substance — to destroy the world s defense systems so he can threaten anyone who opposes him. Since the nanobots are inactive in the cold, he plans to use ice cubes to distribute them. After Connors, Dr. Brinkman, and François leave the lab, Cody tries to take one of the ice cubes, only for it to melt his shoe when in his possession.

Shortly after this, Cody fights male bullies, at the party. The fight makes the school newspaper, and the CIA suspends Cody from the mission. Meanwhile, with Connors refusing to aid him in his plans, Dr. Brinkman sends François and some men to catch Natalie and bring her into his base in the Cascade Mountains. Meanwhile, disobeying orders to leave her out of it, Cody and Natalie eat ice cream at a restaurant. Cody attempts to explain things to Natalie but François and a group of henchmen come over to their table, beat Cody up, and take Natalie. Cody is fully removed from the mission and is grounded for being missing for hours from his house.

Cody gets his brother Alex to make sure his parents do not find out that he has disappeared by giving him the $5,000 the CIA gave him. Knowing Natalie s location via a tracking device in a necklace he gave her as a birthday present, Cody breaks into the CIA weapons hold and steals a rocket powered snowboard and other devices to rescue Natalie. Cody gets a ride to the top of the mountain and snowboards to the factory where Natalie is held. However, he gets caught in a grove of trees as Ronica finds him using a SoloTrek XFV. After convincing her that they need to rescue Natalie, the pair infiltrate the laboratory and Cody rescues Natalie, also explaining the truth about why he went out with her.

However, the trio are captured by Brinkman s men, although Cody quickly escapes. Natalie is held hostage by Dr. Brinkman, who puts an ice cube with a nanobot inside on her forehead to make her father program the system. Cody sets off a series of explosive charges he and Ronica planted throughout the base, and in the ensuing battle, Ronica fights off several of Dr. Brinkman s men, and Natalie kills Dr. Brinkman by placing the ice cube with the nanobots into his mouth, causing it to melt, and the nanobots to devour him from the inside out. Cody later defeats François and sends him to the CIA using the SoloTrek XFV, before fleeing the exploding facility in a helicopter with Ronica, Natalie and Dr. Connors. The CIA welcomes Cody back to the team and congratulates him for completing the mission, and Cody decides to have Natalie earn her drivers license as a reward in which she succeeds in. Then they stop by at a beach cutting Ronica off when she calls. They then kiss starting a relationship.

Cast

• Frankie Muniz as Agent Cody Banks, a 15-year-old teenager who applies for the junior ops division
• Hilary Duff as Natalie Connors, Cody’s girlfriend, a 16-year-old teenager
• Angie Harmon as Veronica Ronica Miles, Cody’s supervisor
• Keith David as CIA Director
• Ian McShane as Dr. Brinkman, leader of the ERIS who wants to take over the world
• Arnold Vosloo as François Molay, Dr. Brinkman s right hand man.
• Martin Donovan as Dr. Albert Connors, Natalie s father
• Daniel Roebuck as Mr. Banks, Cody s father
• Cynthia Stevenson as Mrs. Banks, Cody s mother
• Connor Widdows as Alex Banks, Cody s 10-year-old younger brother
• Darrell Hammond as Earl
• Peter New as Rosychuk
• Noel Fisher as Fenster
• Jessica Harmon as Natalie s friend

Production

For his participation in the film, Frankie Muniz was paid $2 million, the highest paid to a child actor at that point since Macaulay Culkin. Agent Cody Banks was developed as part of a broader strategy by MGM to make less-expensive films that can appeal to younger and niche audiences. Both Muniz and Angie Harmon did most of their own stunts for the film. The film used Media.net’s Edit System Dailies to transfer pre-digitized Avid system files from the post production facility Rainmaker in Vancouver directly to the pic’s editing rooms in Los Angeles without having to wait for tapes to be delivered, allowing producers and executives to receive their viewing copies half a day sooner than through the traditional method.

Reception

The film received generally mixed reviews. Review aggregate Rotten Tomatoes gave the film a 39% Rotten rating, stating that the film should satisfy young teens, but offers nothing new for those who are familiar with the formula.

Agent Cody Banks opened at #2 with $14,064,317 behind Bringing Down the House s second weekend. By the time the film closed on July 31, 2003, the film had earned $47,938,330 domestically and an additional $10,857,484 internationally, adding up to a total $58,795,814.

Home media

Agent Cody Banks was released on VHS and DVD on August 5, 2003, and the Blu-ray was then released on May 24, 2016.

Controversy

When the film was released on home video, MGM included an apologetic paragraph in response to a throwaway line involving Special ed . The furor erupted over an almost throwaway line in the film, at the end of the testy first meeting between the film’s protagonist, played by Frankie Muniz, and his love interest, played by Hilary Duff. After Muniz’s character stumbles through several inane questions, Duff’s character barks, “Are you in special ed?” and stomps off.

Regarding the references to special ed in the movie, we in no way meant to be insensitive to kids with special educational needs. Rather, it was meant to show how cruel kids can be to one another. As you have seen, Cody overcomes his own speech problems and saves the day. Thank you to those who brought this to our attention. We will be mindful of it in the sequel.”

Broadcast

In India and Israel, the film was premiered on Jetix.

In Italy, it was aired on Sky Cinema then on K2, Frisbee, and Paramount Channel.

In Southeast Asia, the film is aired on Fox Family Movies, along with Agent Cody Banks 2: Destination London.

Sequel

Muniz reprised his title role in the sequel, Agent Cody Banks 2: Destination London, was released on March 12, 2004. Duff and Angie Harmon were replaced by Anthony Anderson and Hannah Spearritt.

Year	2003
ReleaseDate	2003-03-14
RuntimeMins	102
RuntimeStr	1h 42min
Plot	A government agent trains Cody Banks in the ways of covert operations that require younger participants.
Awards	Awards, 5 nominations
Directors	Harald Zwart
Writers	Ashley Miller, Zack Stentz, Scott Alexander
Stars	Frankie Muniz, Hilary Duff, Andrew Francis
Produced by	Jason Alexander,Jennifer Birchfield-Eick,Robert Meyer Burnett,Kerry David,David Glasser,Danny Gold,Tom Gulbrandsen,Brede Hovland,Michael Jackman,Andreas Klein,Madonna,Mark Morgan,David Nicksay,Guy Oseary,Dylan Sellers,Molly Donna Ware,Bob Yari,Veslemoey Ruud Zwart
Music by	John Powell
Cinematography by	Denis Crossan
Film Editing by	Jim Miller
Casting By	John Papsidera
Production Design by	Frank Dunlop,Rusty Smith
Art Direction by	Kelvin Humenny
Set Decoration by	Lesley Beale
Costume Design by	Suzanne McCabe
Makeup Department	Gitte Axen,Donna Bis,Shannon Coppin,Rosalina Da Silva,Adruitha Lee,Teresa A. Meyer,Ryan Nicholson,Robert A. Pandini,Christ Stanley,Brenda Turner,Stacey Butterworth
Production Management	George Chapman,David Nicksay,Linda Sheehy-Brownstein,Bryan Yaconelli
Second Unit Director or Assistant Director	Scott J. Ateah,Stuart Becker,James Bitonti,Jim Brebner,Tarnya Cook,Lesley DeHaan,Jena Fraser,Blair Freeman-Marsh,Warren Hanna,Bill Heath,Dwane Launt,Terry Leonard,Kevin Parks,Andrew M. Robinson
Art Department	David Asmodeus,Vaughan V. Baker,Victoria Balharry,Craig Brisker,Karen Brooks,Noel Burke-Gaffney,Chad Calder,Niki Charalambopoulos,Andrew Currie,Michael Dundas,Frank Dunlop,Laurie Edmundson,JoAnn Ellis,Donald Engel,Jack Gauvreau,Brent Gloeckler,Mark Haddad,Randy Hutniak,Paul Jenkinson,Carl Johansen,Lance Johnson,Michael Jovanovski,Nadine Kowalchuk,Warren Lever,Marta McLaughlin,Wayne McLaughlin,Ryan Ostiguy,Megan Poss,Richard Schultz,Nadine Sekora,Macleod Sinclaire,Mark Stainthorpe,Faye Thorp,Ivana Vasak,Sandy Walker,Geoff Wallace,Files Wicken,Mikal Williams,Jenny Wilson,Glenn Woodruff,Gary Young,Audra Neil
Sound Department	Richard L. Anderson,Mike Chock,Mark Coffey,Wendy Czajkowsky,Gary Gegan,Robert Getty,Anthony J. Giacinti,Avram D. Gold,Amy Hammer,Matthew Iadarola,Thomas Jones,Shawn Kennelly,Jeff Kushner,Carmen Lavender,Howard London,Laura Macias,Rick Mitchell,Chris Navarro,Andy Peach,Bryan Pennington,Paul Rodriguez,Sean Rowe,Scott Schmidt,Reuben Simon,Ralph Stuart,Larry Sutton,Kevin Tayler,Jussi Tegelman,Eric Thompson,Marvin Walowitz,Keren Falkenstein,Shawn Ian Kerkhoff,Onofre Ortega,Erin Michael Rettig,Jason Schmid,Brian Slack
Special Effects by	Scott Armstrong,Chris Bignell,Todd Bilawchuk,Dan Cervin,Rod Currie,Rory Cutler,Darya Douglas-Andres,Frank Dunlop,Chris Flemington,Garnet Harry,Gary Heidrick,Tony Lazarowich,Eric Lemay,Grant Smith,Jayme Smith,Scott R. Treliving,Robert Yeager
Visual Effects by	David Behar,Franklin Cofod,Clay Dale,Victor DiMichina,Joe Dubs,Kevin Fisher,Patrick Flanagan,Nate Haggard,Mike Hardison,Bruce Harris,Matt Haslam,James David Hattin,Brad Herman,Jason Hill,Sherry Hitch,Bonnie Kanner,George Macri,John R. McConnell,Ray McIntyre Jr.,Brad Moylan,Patrick Murphy,Christian John Murray,Ray Scalice,Neal Sopata,Geordie Spradling,Kevin Struckman,Devin Uzan,Juan Carlos Vargas,Daniel James Weber,Brandon MacDougall,John R. McConnell,Alfredo Ramirez,Andrew Romine,Sebastian Sue
Stunts	Ed Anders,Brett Armstrong,Scott J. Ateah,Shawn Beaton,Curt Bonn,Sherry Boyd,Artine Tony Browne,Leanne Buchanan,Simon Burnett,Jason Calder,Dave Campbell,Kirk Caouette,Brett Chan,Raymond Chan,Douglas Chapman,Alex Chiang,Kimberly Chiang,Laura Lee Connery,Mike Crestejo,Vince Crestejo,Garvin Cross,Crystal Dalman,Mike Desabrais,Duane Dickinson,Mike Dopud,Joe Doserro,Jim Dunn,Bill Edwards,Glenn Ennis,Ryan Ennis,Caroline Field,Mike Godenir,Lars Grant,Brian Ho,Kathy Hubble,Yvette Jackson,Brad Kelly,Jon Kralt,Randy Lee,Terrance Leigh,Don Lew,Cotton Mather,Steven McMichael,Phillip Mitchell,Gaston Morrison,Jovan Nenadic,Gerald Paetz,Rick Pearce,Simon Pidgeon,Dan Redford,Jeffrey C. Robinson,Gray Rodier,Raymond Sammel,Chad Sayn,Chris Sayour,Darryl Scheelar,Todd Scott,Sharon Simms,Kimani Ray Smith,Kendra Starr,Quinn Starr,Heath Stevenson,Lori Stewart,Brian Tonomura,Owen Walstrom,Chris Webb,Claire Webb,Lee Whittaker
Camera and Electrical Department	Paul Arnel,Rey Astronomo,Tim Atkins,Cameron Beck,Harold Bernard,Ron Bowen,Chris Cochrane,Roberto W. Contreras D.,Ken Decker,Enrique Del Rio,Herb DeWaal,Douglas R. Field,Darryl Foulds,Ross Framo,Aris Georgiopoulos,Simon Hall,Bill Heath,Tim Heller,Karl Herrmann,Trevor Holbrook,James L. Hurford,Dale H. Jahraus,Gaetan Jalbert,James Kantola,Tim Moynihan,Rob Parisien,Andrew Pedley,Diyah Pera,Larry Portmann,Clayton Richard-Long,John Seale,Paul Sheridan,Igor Shtenz,John Spencer-Phillips,Keith Thompson,Jeff Upton,Jim van Dijk,Brian Whittred,Kurt Zelmer,Jim Filippone,Rod Newby,Ian Speed,Jim van Dijk
Animation Department	Justin Knowles
Casting Department	Heike Brandstatter,Andrea Brown,Barbara Harris,Andrea Hughes,Errin Lally,Coreen Mayrs,Wendy O Brien,Edward D. Rea,Kathleen Tomasik
Costume and Wardrobe Department	Suzanne Armstrong,Anne Burke,Nancy Duggan,Alison Fraser,Lise Hache,Susie Hill,Ellen Mirojnick,Barb Nixon,Kim Schwandt
Editorial Department	Travis Avitabile,Terry Brown,Gary Burritt,Howie Edelson,Valance Eisleben,Nancy Fuller,Mike Koz,Dennis McNeill,Jay Steinberg,Stacy Underhill,Tim Vincent
Location Management	Stuart Becker,Bruce L. Brownstein,Flemming Lund,Chris Thoma,Linda Yip
Music Department	Darrell Alexander,Bunny Andrews,Julian Bratolyubov,Kevin Connolly,Sandy DeCrescent,Brian Dixon,George Doering,Shannon Erbe,Elizabeth Finch,Michael Fisher,Bruce Fowler,Walt Fowler,Kevin Globerman,Endre Granat,Brad Haehnel,Clayton Haslop,Sean M. Hickey,The Hollywood Studio Orchestra,Julianne Jordan,Randy Kerber,Daniel Lerner,T.J. Lindgren,Tom MacDougall,Ladd McIntosh,James McKee Smith,Chris Montan,Yvonne S. Moriarty,Stephanie Murray,Mike Nowak,Joel J. Richard,Michele Richards,Peter Rotter,Bob Sanders,Lisbeth Scott,James Thatcher,John Ashton Thomas,Sebastian Toettcher,Paul Wertheimer,Booker White,The Hollywood Studio Symphony
Script and Continuity Department	Jessica Clothier,Danielle de Smit,Lara Fox
Transportation Department	Barry Chapman,Gordon Chitty,Paul Irvine,Dennis Stone
Additional Crew	Michele Barber,Rolly Bartlett,John Bolton,Margaret Breard,Byron Brisco,Dave Brolin,Artine Tony Browne,Shauna Bryan,Neil Caldwell,Rhiannon A. Charles,Tom Chen,Kim Cossaboom,Jason Crosby,Ian Doig,Bobby Edner,Jim Filippone,Sean Patrick Finnan,Eric Fitzgerald,Wayne Flann,Bruce Fontaine,Julia Frittaion,Kate Gajdosik,Bonny Giardina,Phillip Glasser,Alexander Glua,Louise M. Hetherington,Boris Ivanov,Victoria James,Eva Jensen,Darren Kaliciak,Steve LeTrung,Nathan Lomax,Asha MacLeod,Grace MacLeod,Sarah Mahoney,Qadesh Markowski,Sandra Matossi,April D. Matthews,Hamish McArthur,Nigel McKissock,Robert Milicevic,Don Munro,Patrick Newall,Johanna Osborne,Darrin Pearson,Dan Redford,Troy Rowland,Peter Ruttan,Chad Sayn,Andrea Sunderland,E. Thompson,Stephen Tibbetts,Mike Townshend,Ty Trand,Trevor Undi,Victor Valencia,Martin Walker,Molly Donna Ware,Barrie Wells,Scotty Whittman,Annie Wilkinson,David Williams,Roger Williams,Terry Wong,Sandra Wood,Steve Woodley,Jason Yee,John Zubatiuk,Terence Chase,Gordon Juli,Dennis Eric Lehman,Chris Sprister
Genres	Action, Adventure, Comedy
Companies	Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM), Splendid Pictures, Maverick Films
Countries	USA, Canada
Languages	English
ContentRating	PG
ImDbRating	5.1
ImDbRatingVotes	35169
MetacriticRating	41
Keywords	spy,teenage boy,teenage protagonist,spoof,hero