MOVIES

Movies are rated on a letter-grade scale, from A to F. Opinions by R-J movie critic Carol Cling (C.C.) are indicated by initials. Other opinions are from wire service critics.

Motion Picture Association of America ratings:

G - General audiences, all ages.

PG - Parental guidance suggested. Some material may not be suitable for children.

PG-13 - Parental guidance suggested. Some material may not be suitable for children under 13.

R - Restricted. Under 17 requires accompanying parent or guardian.

NC-17 - No one under 17 admitted.

NR - Not rated.

FORGETTING SARAH MARSHALL

(C) Dumped by his TV-star girlfriend (Kristen Bell) after six years together, a struggling musician (Jason Segel, a cross between Albert Brooks' sad-eyed clown and Will Ferrell's bubbly klutz) struggles to recover with a solo trip to Hawaii -- where he winds up in the same hotel as Sarah and her new British-rocker boyfriend. Sporadically funny, yet this latest from the Judd Apatow comedy factory lacks the crackle and snap of previous Apatow-zers; the sell-by date is getting ever closer. (112 min.) R; sexual content, profanity, graphic nudity.

GET SMART

(C+) Missed it by that much: Steve Carell steps into the (phone-equipped) shoes of Don Adams to play bumbling Maxwell Smart, a world-class intelligence analyst who finally gets the chance to trade his desk job for a globe-trotting field assignment, accompanied by savvy Agent 99 (Anne Hathaway). By grafting a typical origin story onto a typically breakneck espionage plot, "Get Smart" fails to capture the delirious slapstick lunacy of the classic '60s sitcom that inspired it. Sorry about that, Chief. (110 min.) PG-13; rude humor, action violence, profanity. (C.C.)

HANCOCK

(C) After he's saved by a boozy, surly superhero (box-office king Will Smith), a struggling L.A. marketing expert (Jason Bateman) volunteers to rehabilitate the snide good guy's tarnished image. It's an intriguing concept, but the iffy execution -- and director Peter Berg's inability to meld the movie's jokey first half with its anguished and emotional conclusion -- makes for a bumpy ride indeed. With Smith, Bateman and Charlize Theron headlining the classy cast, it's a downright shame imagining what might have been -- if only "Hancock" had lived up to their potential. (92 min.) PG-13; intense sci-fi action and violence, profanity. (C.C.)

THE HAPPENING

(C) He still sees dead people, but this time they're in a dead movie: Writer-director M. Night Shyamalan ("The Sixth Sense," "Signs") tries, and fails, to revive his movie mojo with this tale of an apocalyptic crisis that triggers global hysteria -- and prompts stars Mark Wahlberg, Zooey Deschanel and John Leguizamo to go on the run. This mash-up of "The Birds" and "War of the Worlds" (or maybe it's "The Birds" meets "The Blob") tries to be topical, but the premise is too thin to deliver any real chills. It's beyond good and evil; it's just dumbfounding -- and dumb. (91 min.) R; violent and disturbing images.

HELLBOY II: THE GOLDEN ARMY

(B) When the mythical world rebels against humanity, hoping to take over Earth, cigar-chomping, beer-guzzling demon superhero Hellboy (Ron Perlman) and his team -- including pyrokinetic girlfriend Liz (Selma Blair), aquatic empath Abe (Doug Jones) and protoplasmic mystic Johann -- lead the charge to save the planet. Like its 2004 predecessor, this has a middling storyline, but it's made memorable by the dark, freaky visions of writer-director Guillermo del Toro, who seems to have transplanted every weird creature he couldn't cram into "Pan's Labyrinth." In case you're wondering, that's a good thing. (110 min.) PG-13; sci-fi action and violence, profanity.

THE INCREDIBLE HULK

(C+) No smash! Edward Norton (who co-wrote the script with "X2's" Zak Penn) takes over from 2003 "Hulk" Eric Bana as troubled physicist Bruce Banner, who keeps trying to extinguish his inner monster, even as he's hounded by a military that wants to harness his mean green power. Starts great, but finishes in noisy, effects-heavy waves of tedium, stranding such capable actors as Norton, William Hurt and Tim Roth. Alas, it's no "Iron Man" -- although if you sit through the credits, a jokey Robert Downey Jr. cameo will remind you how much better "Iron Man" is. (138 min.) PG-13; sci-fi action violence, disturbing images, brief partial nudity.

INDIANA JONES AND THE KINGDOM OF THE CRYSTAL SKULL

(A) Whip-crackin' good: Indiana Jones (inimitable, irreplaceable Harrison Ford) returns to derring-duty, reuniting with director Steven Spielberg and executive producer George Lucas for an exhilarating, thrill-a-minute romp that recaptures "Raiders of the Lost Ark's" gleeful spirit. This time out, it's 1957, and a graying, gritty Indy teams up with a rebellious teen (Shia LaBeouf) and "Raiders" flame Marion Ravenwood (Karen Allen) to battle Soviet spies (led by Oscar-winner Cate Blanchett) hot on the trail of a mystical Amazon artifact that may hold the key to life on earth -- and beyond. (124 min.) PG-13; adventure violence, scary images. (C.C.)

IRON MAN

(B) Up, up and away: The summer blockbuster season gets off to a flying start with this fast, funny retooling of the tired superhero genre, as jet-setting zillionaire arms merchant Tony Stark (a magnetic Robert Downey Jr.), captured by terrorists, devises a flying metal suit and weapons system, transforming himself from war profiteer to hero-with-a-conscience. It's still the same old story, but a top-chop cast (including Gwyneth Paltrow, Jeff Bridges and Terrence Howard) and a sly sense of humor make almost everything old new again. (126 min.) PG-13; sci-fi action and violence, brief sexual references. (C.C.)

JOURNEY TO THE CENTER OF THE EARTH

(B-) In your face, in more ways than one: The first live-action feature shot in digital 3-D is an update of Jules Verne's durable 1864 fantasy, about an absent-minded professor (Brendan Fraser), his surly teenage nephew (Josh Hutcherson) and an Icelandic guide (Anita Briem) on a fantastical, and possibly fatal, journey to the otherworldly (innerworldly?) title realm. Without 3-D, this is just another empty-calories cinematic thrill ride; with 3-D, it's still a cinematic thrill ride, but at least it's a relatively fun one, chock full of reach-out-and-touch images guaranteed to make you giggle, squirm -- or do both at the same time. (92 min.) PG; intense adventure action, scary moments. (C.C.)

KIT KITTREDGE: AN AMERICAN GIRL

(B) "Little Miss Sunshine's" Abigail Breslin stars as the first "American Girl" heroine to make it to the big screen; she's a plucky Depression-era lass who's determined to get an article published in the local newspaper -- and help the down-on-their-luck hoboes haunting her neighborhood. This classy, heart-on-its-sleeve movie's commitment to down-home values, meticulously researched back stories and be-all-you-can-be girl power has a seductive wholesomeness -- and laudable life lessons appropriate for any era, including our own. (100 min.) G; all ages.

KUNG FU PANDA

(C) Kung phooey: This computer-animated romp follows the fortunes of roly-poly Po (voiced by Jack Black), a pot-bellied panda who's plucked from obscurity to train as a martial arts warrior under the tutelage of pint-sized Master Shifu (a wry Dustin Hoffman). Kids will adore the broad slapstick (and maybe even the "you gotta believe" homilies), but the all-star vocal cast (including Jackie Chan, David Cross, Angelina Jolie, Lucy Liu and Ian McShane) is largely wasted and the movie never figures out how mesh its comedic and chop-socky elements. (124 min.) PG; martial arts action. (C.C.)

THE LOVE GURU

(D) Raised by gurus, American-born Pitka (Mike Myers) returns to the U.S. to break into the self-help business as the title swami. His first challenge: a lovelorn hockey star whose wife has left him for a rival. This alleged comedy of low blows and elephantine misfires wastes the varied talents of everyone from Jessica Alba to Justin Timberlake to Ben Kingsley, illustrating the shrinking imagination of Myers, who continues to believe that penis activity and the politically incorrect are the cutting edge of screen humor. Not! (88 min.) PG-13; crude and sexual content throughout, profanity, comic violence, drug references.

MEET DAVE

(C+) Newly arrived New Yorker Dave Ming Chang (Eddie Murphy) seems suspiciously uncomfortable in his own skin -- possibly because he's not really a he at all, but a space ship built in the image of its miniature-sized captain. Elizabeth Banks, Gabrielle Union and Scott Caan co-star for Murphy's "Norbit" director, Brian Robbins, in a family-friendly sci-fi comedy that might have been developed for Murphy's "Bowfinger" co-star Steve Martin. Murphy is frighteningly funny at suggesting that Dave is a sophisticated piece of machinery occupied by a crew at cross purposes; once again, he proves he can do anything -- even in a movie that's not up to his talents. (90 min.) PG; bawdy and suggestive humor and action, profanity.

MONGOL

(B) This sweeping, Oscar-nominated epic, from award-winning Russian filmmaker Sergei Bodrov ("Prisoner of the Mountains"), traces the rise of Genghis Khan (played by Japanese pop star Tadanobu Asano) from nomadic boy prince to conqueror -- and founder of the 12th-century realm that became history's largest contiguous empire. Highly entertaining and replete with highly stylized mayhem and even romance; if Bodrov's goal was to humanize a man synonymous with conquest and invasion, he's succeeded. In Mongolian with English subtitles. (124 min.) R; bloody combat sequences.

PRICELESS

(C) "Amélie's" Audrey Tautou stars as a serial gold-digger on the Riviera who mistakes a hotel bartender ("The Valet's" disarming Gad Elmaleh) for a wealthy guest, igniting his passions in a frothy French romantic comedy that plays like a broadly amoral take on "Breakfast at Tiffany's." Alas, it suffers from a serious case of who-should-we-care-for: He's a sap, she's a soulless vamp and their patrons are either cruel, self-deluding or both. In French with English subtitles. (104 min.) PG-13; sexual content, nudity.

SEX AND THE CITY

(C) Let's not get Carried away: After a four-year hiatus, the HBO comedy's fab four -- Carrie (Sarah Jessica Parker), Samantha (Kim Cattrall), Miranda (Cynthia Nixon) and Charlotte (Kristin Davis) -- return for what feels like an entire season of shoe love, true love and everything in between, all crammed into one loooooooooong sitting. Fans undoubtedly will revel in every bloated moment, but this never finds a middle ground between its TV roots and its big-screen incarnation, so those who never acquired an addiction to the series may wonder what the frenzy was, and is, all about. (145 min.) R; strong sexual situations, graphic nudity, profanity. (C.C.)

WALL-E

(A) Play it again, Pixar: "Finding Nemo" writer-director Andrew Stanton strikes again with a wonderful, full-of-wonder tale about a lonely garbage-compactor robot, stranded on an abandoned 29th-century Earth, who follows an alluring probe droid back to her mother ship -- and discovers what happened to the humans who used to occupy the planet. Skipping from poignant comedy to sly satire, "Wall-E" deftly synthesizes cinematic influences from Charlie Chaplin to "Star Wars' " R2-D2, yet never feels derivative, thanks to a magical blend of soaring imagination and down-to-earth emotions. Preceded by the hilarious short "Presto," about an arrogant magician, his hungry bunny and not one but two magic hats. (97 min.) G; all ages. (C.C.)

WANTED

(C-) Un-"Wanted": Angelina Jolie plays a kick-butt killer training a mild-mannered office drone ("Atonement's" James McAvoy) to take his place in an ancient, clandestine society of assassins. This mindless, soulless action workout directed (make that overdirected) by Russia's Timur Bekmambetov ("Nightwatch," "Daywatch") confuses quantity with quality, style with substance, adrenaline with artistry. Not content to concentrate on mere mayhem, it aims for something more, and winds up achieving less, trying to pass off a heaping helping of the old ultra-violence as something visionary and profound. (C.C.)

WHAT HAPPENS IN VEGAS

(C) Nothing unexpected happens in this upbeat fluff, as two vacationing New Yorkers (Cameron Diaz as a workaholic, Ashton Kutcher as a slacker) meet cute in Vegas, get plastered and get married, only to put their morning-after annulment on hold so they can hold onto a $3 million slot jackpot. It's nothing we haven't seen before -- and won't see again. Yet as the movie stumbles through its connect-the-dots plot and sitcom-style slapstick, there's a frustrating sense of missed opportunities -- and missing smarts. (98 min.) PG-13; sexual and crude content, profanity, drug references. (C.C.)