Before the opening credits are over, we’ve seen bathroom jokes and sexual humor, but at least this time it’s rated PG.

It really is a shame, because Eddie Murphy is just great as Dr. Dolittle, content to be the straight man to an adorable assortment of wise-cracking animals. And the story is a cute one. It’s a twist on the old classic “Born Free.” Dolittle needs to introduce a tame bear into the forest so that he can mate with the last female of their endangered species, in order to protect the forest from developers. Steve Zahn and Lisa Kudrow provide voices for the two bears so deliciously perfect that we want them to get together as much as Dolittle does. Meanwhile, Dolittle has some problems at home with a teen-aged daughter who has a new boyfriend (rapper Lil’ Zane) and a secret she isn’t ready to discuss.

Parents should know that the movie is raunchier than the usual PG, with a lot of bathroom humor and sexual references (kids may ask what it means to be “in heat”), but it is much milder and sweeter than other Murphy vehicles like the PG-13-rated first episode and the “Nutty Professor” movies.

Families who see this movie should talk about the difficulty of responding to the needs of the family and the responsibility to help others. They may also want to talk about the way that children sometimes feel embarassed by their parents, and the importance of listening to the people you love. Families might want to spend some time in a nature preserve and discuss ways to make sure that animals are treated with respect and dignity.

Families who enjoy this movie will also enjoy “Cats and Dogs.” They might like to see the original “Dr. Dolittle” movie, a musical starring Rex Harrison.

This is a dreadful movie. Shakespeare is multi-facted enough to stand up to almost every possible kind of interpretation and adaptation. Almost. This version, using much of the original language but set in modern-day New York, is so poorly produced and directed that there would be serious doubt that the cast speaks English if it were not made up of such well- known and accomplished actors. So we have to blame the director since most of the time, it sounds as though they are repeating nonsense syllables that they have memorized. Diane Venora as Gertrude and Liev Shreiber as Laertes are the only ones who have moments of connection to the material. What we get from the others instead is tricks of juxtaposition, Elizabethan language amidst 21st century technology.

Remember the “to be or not to be” speech? Ethan Hawke, who wears an idiotic knitted ski cap through much of the movie and mopes around like a teenager who has been grounded, recites that speech while walking through the aisles at Blockbuster. He leaves the “get thee to a nunnery” speech for Ophelia on her answering machine. Polonius (Bill Murray) soliloquizes to a security camera. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern report back to Gertrude and Claudius by speakerphone and Hamlet lets them know he’s coming home by fax. And the play “to catch the conscience of the king” is a video Hamlet screens for his horrified family.

Teen fans of the performers who want to see this movie should go. Even in a monotone, the language and story are worthwhile, and it may inspire them to look at one of the better versions (especially those starring Mel Gibson and Laurence Olivier) on video. Families whose teenagers see this movie should talk about how to respond to injustice, the importance of communication, and how different performers and different times lead to different interpretations of the classics.

Families who enjoy this movie should see some of the other filmed versions, including the ones with Mel Gibson, Kenneth Branaugh, and Laurence Olivier.

Did anyone even read this script before deciding to make the movie?

Did anyone even write it, or was it just made up on the spot by 10 year olds?

This is a movie about a man named Joe (Tim Allen) who is slapped in the face by a bully (Patrick Warburton) in an altercation at the parking lot at work. His daughter, who has come with him for “Take Your Daughters to Work Day,” sees her father get hit, and sees his humiliation afterward. He is so depressed that he sits at home in his bloody shirt for three days, until Meg (Julie Bowen), the office “wellness” coordinator, comes over and asks him what he wants. A lightbulb goes on over his head — aha! What he wants is to challenge the bully to a rematch. As soon as word gets out, he is suddenly Mr. Popularity around the office. So, all he has to do is spend three weeks taking fighting lessons from a former star of low-budget action movies, and he’ll be all set.

So the message of this movie is that being popular and being willing and able to beat someone up are what really matter. On the way to the final confrontation there is a lot of comic violence (including two below-the-belt injuries that are supposed to be funny). Despite his commitment to his daughter, he seems completely insensitive to the impact of his actions on her. And there is also something very icky about the way that Joe’s ex-wife becomes attracted to him again when she sees how newly tough he is, so she puts on a sexy red teddy and tries to sneak into his house to get back together with him. To make it worse, it is their daughter who stops her, in a strange scene that makes it clear that any parenting in that relationship is going to the mother, not from the mother.

Attractive and talented performers are completely wasted in this movie. Despite a couple of nice moments between Meg and Joe, and the use of the truly magnificent Eva Cassidy song “Songbird,” it is an almost unalloyed disappointment.

Parents should know that the movie has very strong language for a PG, including many words they would not want their children to use. Joe smokes a cigar as an emblem of machismo. Characters drink and there is a scene in a bar. The entire theme of fighting back is very poorly handled. And some kids will be upset by the neglect of Joe’s child.

Families who enjoy this movie will enjoy some of Allen’s other movies much more. Try The Santa Clause and one of my all-time favorites, Galaxy Quest.

There is a sub-category of comedy that can only be termed “comedies of excruciation,” in which we laugh at the hideously humiliating experiences of some poor sap. If this is your kind of humor, then this is your kind of movie.

Think about the most stressful emotional situation imaginable and, if you are past your teens and before your 15th high school reunion it is likely to be meeting the family of the person you love. Now imagine that your beloved’s father specialized in sweating the truth out of double agents in the CIA and all your worst fears about exposing every miserable incident in your whole miserable life come together into one endless nightmare.

That is the plot of “Meet Your Parents,” written by the screenwriter of the awful “Meet the Deedles” (who will we meet in his next movie?) and directed by the director of “Austin Powers.” Ben Stiller plays Greg, who loves Pam (“Felicity’s” Teri Polo) and wants to make a good impression on her father, Jack (Robert De Niro). But everything goes wrong. Jack’s natural over-protectiveness meets with Greg’s panicky clumsiness and, depending on your sense of humor, it is either hilarious or agonizing or both. There are many jokes about Greg’s name (Focker, get it?) and his occupation (nurse, which isn’t manly, get it?). The airline loses Greg’s suitcase, so he has to borrow bizarre clothes — enormous pants from Pam’s brother, a tiny Speedo bathing suit from Pam’s former fiancé. Jokes center on a catheter, a “Mountie strap-on dildo,” a cat who uses the toilet, a cat strung out on nicotine gum, a fire, and an overflowing septic tank. Greg is compared to Pam’s sister’s fiancé, a doctor, and to Pam’s former boyfriend, now fabulously wealthy and still pining for her. Greg, who is Jewish, is asked to say grace at dinner, and can only helplessly babble the lyrics from “Godspell.” And, in the movie’s high point, Greg has to cope with the only situation more grueling than a terrifying in-law — airline bureaucracy.

Parents should know that the movie has some strong language, drug use, sexual references and situations, and potty humor.

Families who see the movie should talk about how some people may make us feel uncomfortable and inadequate, and about how even non-CIA families have a “circle of trust” that is very important to them. They may want to discuss how families see the people who want to marry a member, and what they can do to get to know one another, and talk about some of their own experiences.

Families who enjoy this movie will also like The In-Laws and The Freshman as well as the sequel, Meet the Fockers.

Renee Zellwegger’s lips should be eligible for their own Oscar. As the waitress who is such a big fan of a soap opera that she becomes convinced she is a character on it, she does more to convey her essential sweetness and strength of character with her lips alone than most actresses could manage using a couple of bodies.

Zellwegger plays Betty, a sweet, trusting woman married to a boorish used car salesman (Aaron Eckhardt, unrecognizable as Erin Brokovich’s biker boyfriend). She does not know that her husband has stolen some heroin and hid it in one of his cars. When he is scalped by a hitman who is searching for the heroin, Betty goes into what psychiatrists call a fugue state. She has no memory of seeing her husband killed. Instead, she thinks she has left him to return to her former fiancé, a soap opera doctor. So, she sets off to find him, not knowing that she is driving the car where her husband stashed the heroin. The two hitmen, Charlie (Morgan Freeman) and Wesley (Chris Rock), follow her so they can kill her. Meanwhile, she goes to Los Angeles, gets a job in a hospital, and meets the actor who plays her dream man.

Betty’s trip from Kansas to Los Angeles recalls the journey of that other famous Kansan, Dorothy. Both go to a fantasy land only to find that the answer is within themselves. As someone tells Betty, “Honey, you don’t need anybody. You know why? Because you’ve got yourself.”

Charlie, too, is chasing a dream, wanting to finish this one last job so he can retire but growing more and more drawn to the woman he is supposed to kill. Betty and Charlie both seek a dream that will let them leave their pasts behind.

Parents should know that the movie, while primarily a comedy, has some scary and violent moments. The scalping scene is pretty grisly. The movie also has strong language and sexual situations.

Families who see this movie should talk about how Betty learned that she could solve her own problems and follow her real dream of becoming a nurse. Betty’s husband describes the soap opera fans as “people with no lives watching each other’s fake lives.” Is that true of anyone who watches any television show or movie, including the people who watch this one? Is there a difference between watching for escape and watching for entertainment or insight? Why would Betty stay with such an awful husband for so long? Were any other characters chasing dreams? Who?

Families who like this movie will also enjoy “Nashville.”