You don’t have to ask where the heart is in this movie – it’s all heart. As you might expect from a movie based on an Oprah book and starring several of Hollywood’s most talented actresses, this is a chick flick that is as yummy as eating bon-bons in a bubble bath.

All of the elements are there — a plucky heroine with adversity to overcome; a love interest who is cute, patient, and endlessly devoted, and who completely adores the heroine’s daughter; an abashed ex-love interest to realize the error of his ways; and an assortment of women friends, also endlessly devoted, to support and be supported, and everyone just as colorful and quirky as can be. If you loved Fried Green Tomatoes and Steel Magnolias, grab some popcorn and a handkerchief and settle in for another juicy classic in that genre. (Why is it, by the way, that these movies always take place in the rural South? Aren’t there ever any colorful and quirky and endlessly devoted people anywhere else?)

Natalie Portman plays Novalee Nation, a pregnant 17-year-old abandoned at a Wal-Mart by her boyfriend. She moves into the Wal-Mart, keeping careful track of everything she takes, and becomes something of a sensation when she ends up having the baby in the store.

Sister Husband (Stockard Channing), a dotty but affectionate recovering alcoholic, takes her in, with the baby. Novalee makes two other friends — Lexie (Ashley Judd), a kind-hearted nurse who is always looking for Mr. Right but finding herself pregnant instead, and Forney (James Frain) a brilliant librarian with a sad secret.

Novalee and her friends cope with tragedy and learn to “let go of what’s gone and hold on like hell to what they’ve got.” They acknowledge the sadness and unfairness and meanness in life, but they “hold on to the goodness and pass it on.” Novalee and Lexie also have to learn to acknowledge that they deserve to be loved and cared for. Lexie finds out that because a man drives a Buick does not make him a winner. The winner is the man who traded a fabulous car to get custody of his stepchild. Novalee learns that she does not have to endure hardship as punishment for her failings, and that she is good enough for the man she loves.

This movie is worth seeing just to watch five of the finest actresses in movies. Natalie Portman is radiant as Novalee, and it is a pleasure to see her bloom before our eyes. Ashley Judd is delicious as Lexie, casually explaining how she named her children after snack foods and lighting up over each new husband prospect. And then she is heart-wrenching when she must deal with the unthinkable. Joan Cusack is sensational as a music promoter who has seen it all and has no illusions. Sally Fields contributes a magnificent cameo as Novalee’s wayward mother. Just the way she smokes a cigarette tells us everything about her life. And Stockard Channing makes us see how Sister Husband’s life may have left her a little addled on minor details, but utterly clear about the important things.

Parents should know that the movie has some strong language and that Novalee and Lexie have children without being married. Sister Husband prays for forgiveness for “fornication.” Women have sex with men who abandon them. One character has sex with someone who has suffered a loss, and the implication is that this is a form of comfort. A character abuses drugs and alcohol, and three others are alcoholics (two recovering). One character is killed and two others are badly injured. A man attempts to molest two children (off-screen).

Families who see this movie should talk about one character’s view that people lie because they are “scared or crazy or just mean,” about another character’s statement that “home is where they catch you when you fall” and about what makes it possible for some people to survive deprivation and tragedy. They should also talk about what made it difficult for Lexie and Novalee to accept love from good men. And they should talk about the extraordinary kindness the characters show each other, particularly the thoughtful way that Sister Husband invites Novalee and her baby to live with her, making it sound as though Novalee is doing her the favor.

Families who enjoy this movie will also enjoy Fried Green Tomatoes and Steel Magnolias.

This is less a movie than a string of skits based on one concept — Martin Lawrence in a fat suit and a dress.

It’s a great concept, crossing two terrific movies: “Stakeout” and “Tootsie,” with a little bit of “Mrs. Doubtfire” and “Some Like it Hot” and “Little Red Riding Hood” thrown in.

Malcolm (Martin Lawrence) and John (Paul Giamatti) are FBI agents trying to track down Lester (Terrence Howard), a bank robber who has escaped from prison. They set up a stakeout across the street from the home of “Big Momma,” the grandmother of Lester’s former girlfriend Sherry (Nia Long). Sherry arrives just as Big Momma leaves town, so Malcolm, a master of disguise, puts on a fat suit and a flowered housedress and is there to greet Sherry and her son Trent with open arms.

It’s a promising premise. But instead of a script, we get a series of situations, strung together in a lackluster story that underuses its three talented stars. Big Momma has to deliver a baby! Big Momma kicks butt at karate class and on the basketball court! Big Momma can’t cook! Big Momma sings in church! Sherry gets scared by a thunderstorm and crawls into bed with Big Momma! Oh, and by the way, Malcolm has to struggle with his feelings for Sherri because he thinks she was Lester’s accomplice and besides, he starts off the movie explaining that a wife and family are just a distraction for a lawman.

It’s a shame, because Lawrence (who also co-produced) is one of the funniest and most talented people around, and he does marvels at times in this movie. Even under all that silicone, he is able to use his eyes and body to hilarious effect. And even under all that broad comedy, he shows us a potential for tenderness and heart so enticing that we wish for more. Nia Long, so marvelous earlier this year in “Boiler Room” has sweetness, toughness, and humor, and it is always a pleasure to see Paul Giamatti, quickly becoming a top character actor.

Lawrence the producer should do better for Lawrence the performer. The script is very weak, relying heavily on bathroom humor, jokes about sexy old people, and “Big Momma’s” highly un-grandmotherly feelings for Sherri. Inconsistencies of plot and character keep the audience from connecting to the material.

Parents should know that the movie contains a lot of sexual humor and potty jokes. There is brief nudity, including the real Big Momma’s backside. Violence includes a menacing bad guy, characters in peril, fighting, and gunplay.

Families who see the movie should discuss Sherri’s mistake and how she handled it, stereotypes of the elderly, how we decide whom to trust, and the way that families support each other through bad times. The role of the church is nicely handled. Families with older children who enjoy this movie will also enjoy “Tootsie,” “Stakeout,” “Some Like It Hot,” and Lawrence’s “Blue Streak.”

More conceptual art and marketing phenomenon than movie, “The Blair Witch Project” is poised to become the most profitable movie of all time. Directors Eduardo Sanchez and Daniel Myrick have learned from canny film- makers like Val Lewton and Alfred Hitchcock — people are much more scared by what they don’t see than by what they do see. The film-makers made a virtue of having no budget for special effects, and left everything to the audience’s grisly imagination. Like some sort of cinematic Rorschach test, as we watch this movie, we are each scared by whatever lurks in our subconscious. The movie’s plot is simply summarized: three film students go into the woods to make a movie about a local legend and never come home. A year later, their footage is found, and what we see is supposed to be what they left behind. Knowing the end from the beginning, the audience is left with 70 minutes of growing dread as the three students become increasingly more panicky and the events turn increasingly more creepy. Then it is over.

Teenagers have always loved scary movies, from the old William Castle movies up through “Nightmare on Elm Street,” “Scream” and “I Still Know What You Did Last Summer.” On one level, they provide peer bonding — you have to be friends with someone you grabbed in a moment of terror and it is fun have that shared experience. On another level, there is something cathartic for teenagers about seeing this graphic representation of an uncontrollable id on the loose. It is important for parents to remember that tolerance for scariness is highly individual, and, especially for teens and younger kids, highly suggestible. In concrete terms, there is nothing really scary in this movie, and parents who do not object to profanity should not have a problem with allowing a kid who really wants to see it to go. They should make sure that those who do see it know — promotional tricks to the contrary — that it is entirely manufactured and fictional. And parents should not hesitate to provide cover to kids who seem uncertain about going, to give them the luxury of saying, “I really want to see it, but my parents would KILL me, and they are even scarier than the Blair Witch!”