Action-comedy is a hard genre to pull off, because you’re essentially making two movies in one. To make a passable film, your punchlines have to hit as hard as your punches, and vice versa. But to make a truly great action-comedy, you need all that plus characters that we grow to truly love, and it’s in that area that Spy proves to be one of the best action-comedies of recent memory.

What’s more, writer/director Paul Feig continues to prove his point that women can not only headline a film but also fill out the majority of its supporting players, making this one of the most unabashedly feminist comedies since Bridesmaids (also by Feig, also starring Melissa McCarthy and Rose Byrne). And like Bridesmaids, it never calls attention to the fact that women do all the heavy lifting. It simply sets out to tell a hilarious, exciting story, which it does exquisitely.

McCarthy has been owning her well-deserved status as funny woman/leading lady for some time now, and with Spy she has perhaps her best role to date. She plays Susan Cooper, a mousy, desk-confined CIA agent who has an incredibly important job: she’s the satellite-assisted eyes and ears for Jude Law’s Bond-spoofing agent Bradley Fine, the kind of guy who can karate-chop his enemies unconscious while never mussing his hair or spilling his martini. Of course, he can only accomplish this with Susan, via his earpiece, telling him exactly what to do and where to go.

Fine soon runs into trouble at the hands of the villainous femme fatale Rayna Boyanov, played to perfection by Rose Byrne. Byrne has been on a roll of her own in recent years, and though she seems incredibly sweet in real life, she’s at her comedic best when playing the uber-est of uber-bitches. In SPY, Feig gifts her with so many hilarious mean-girl one-liners that I heard audience members around me immediately and constantly repeating them.

When Fine disappears and all active field agents’ names are leaked, an unknown is needed to go looking for him, and Susan, who is of course in love with Fine, volunteers. Her no-nonsense boss (a perfectly-cast Allison Janney) preps her for field work and learns Susan has a few tricks of her own, including a not-too-deeply-buried violent streak.

Susan’s early adventures in the field are where the movie truly begins to soar, and every scene she shares with Byrne is comic gold. I’d love to see this duo continue in other movies, because their chemistry is spot-on. And while Miranda Hart gets some great gags as Susan’s incompetent but lovable sidekick and Jason Statham is - wait for it - a comedic revelation (I’m totally serious), the movie truly and rightfully belongs to McCarthy. She's magnetic on screen, and Spy takes that fact and runs with it.

The plot moves briskly until the last act, when the two-hour running time does feel a little long, but that’s a small complaint for what otherwise serves simultaneously as: a perfect Bond parody (complete with awesome opening song), a Bechdel-test demolishing feminist piece, a slickly directed action flick with excellent and elaborate fight scenes, and a knee-slapping comedy. That’s a lot to pack in, but Spy makes it look easy.

Spy is rated R and opens nationwide Friday.