It sounds like it can’t miss — a delicious situation created by a guy who knows how to write jokes, with an all-star cast. But it does miss. Billy Crystal, who wrote the script with Peter Tolan, delivers wisecracks, but he gives us television sitcom-like “onesa” characters (i.e., “one’s a spoiled diva, one’s a preening Spanish lover type”) whose behavior seems prompted by whatever suits the scene rather than any kind of emotional truth — and that, after all, is as central to the success of a comedy as it is to a drama.

“America’s Sweethearts” are two beloved screen idols whose films together have thrilled audiences and filled studio bank accounts. But she (Catherine Zeta Jones as Gwen) has fallen for someone else and he (John Cusack as Eddie) has had a nervous breakdown. Now their last film together is about to be released, and the studio is desperate for them to bring all of their star power as a couple to the press junket. Since the studio head has not actually seen the movie, all he has to stir up support from the press is Gwen and Eddie. And the person responsible for making it all work is Lee (Crystal), a publicist so dedicated that he says if her heard that his mother died, he would spin the news by saying how much she would have loved the movie.

A few insider digs at Hollywood and the press, repeated behavior with no apparent motivation, and some extended vulgar humor keep derailing this movie every time Roberts’ 1000-watt smile or one of the other star turns comes close to making it work.

Parents should know that the movie is raunchier than many PG-13s, with intended humor coming from an (inaccurate) accusation of public masturbation and from insults about another man’s genital size. The movie has strong language and sexual references and situations, and some comic violence. Characters drink and use (and possibly abuse) prescription drugs. A mental breakdown is treated as a comic development, mere self-indulgence rather than a legitimate illness.

Families who enjoy this movie will also enjoy “Notting Hill” and “The Runaway Bride.” They might also like to see some classic earlier comedies about Hollywood, like “Sullivan’s Travels,” “Singin’ in the Rain,” and “Bombshell.”

Plot: In 1839, a group of Africans sold into slavery were being transported to the United States on a Spanish ship. Off the coast of Cuba, they escaped from their shackles and attacked the crew, leaving two crew members alive to take them back to Africa. The Spanish sailors tricked the Africans and sailed up the coast of the United States until an American naval ship off the coast of Connecticut captures them. The Africans were brought into court to determine their fate. They were claimed as property (“like livestock”) by both the Spanish crew and by the American captors.

Roger Baldwin (Matthew McConaughey), a property lawyer persuades abolitionists Theodore Joadson (Morgan Freeman) and Lewis Tappan (Stellan Skarsgård) that he has a theory that will help the Africans. He argues that it is not a property case at all. The law provides that only the child of slaves can be a slave. Since the Africans were not born slaves they are free, and their actions were merely self-defense in aid of restoring their freedom. If Baldwin can prove that they were born as free people in Africa, and not, as their captors alleged, slaves in the West Indies, they would not be considered property; they would be considered human beings.

The trial attracts the attention of President Martin Van Buren (Nigel Hawthorne), who is in the midst of a campaign for re-election and very aware that he will need the support of Southern voters to win. He is under additional pressure from the eleven-year-old queen of Spain, Isabella II, and her ambassador, who raise claims on behalf of the Spanish fleet. When the judge and jury appear sympathetic to the Africans, Van Buren arranges for a new judge to hear the case without a jury.

Meanwhile, the Africans try to understand what is going on around them. Baldwin and Joadson are able to find a man who speaks Mende, the language of Cinqué (Djimon Hounsou) and some of the other Africans. They win in court and the government appeals. Former President John Quincy Adams (Anthony Hopkins) represents them before the U.S. Supreme Court, where seven of the nine Justices are slaveholders. In a moving and eloquent argument, he persuades the Justices (with one dissenter) that the Africans were free, and that if they had been white, they would have been called heroes for rebelling against those who tried to take that freedom away.

Discussion: Adams explains that in court the one with the best story wins. Indeed, we hear many different stories in the course of the movie as each character tries to explain why his view is the right one. In the first courtroom scene we hear several different “stories” about what should happen to the Africans. All of those stories assume that the Africans are property; the only question is whose property they are. Interestingly, as “property,” they can not be charged with murder or theft. One cannot be both property and capable of forming criminal intent. The only issue before the court is where the Africans will go.

As Baldwin begins to tell Joadson and Tappan his “story” of the case, we see them slowly becoming aware of what had always been obvious to us. The Africans cannot be property. They were free, in which case their actions were not only honorable but heroic, in the same category as America’s founding fathers, our own “story” about who we are as Americans. Despite the attempts of Van Buren to subvert the legal system established just decades before, the essential commitment to freedom is so much a part of the story that, at least in this one brief moment, justice triumphed. Adams, the son of the second President, made that his story.

Questions for Kids:

· Why was it important to prove where the Africans were from?

· What was Calhoun’s justification for slavery?

· Why does Tappan say that the death of the Africans may help the cause of abolition more than their freedom?

· Why does Spielberg organize his story this way, taking the audience from the confrontation to the courtroom and only later providing the background about the capture of the Africans?

· What does it mean that there is no Mende word for “should”?

Connections: Chief Justice Storey is portrayed by real-life former Supreme Court Justice Harry Blackmun.

A sumptuous (if completely inaccurate) animated retelling of the mystery of the Tsar’s lost daughter, this movie will captivate kids and their families.

In this version, the little Anastasia and her adored grandmother (voice of Angela Lansbury) are separated after escaping the execution of the royal family. Years later, “Anna” (voice of Meg Ryan), who remembers nothing of her early years, leaves the orphanage where she has been raised, and goes off in search of her family. She is discovered by a couple of con men who have been searching for a young woman they can pass off as Anastasia, to get a reward from the dowager grandmother, who now lives in Paris. They persuade her that they are just trying to help her find out whether she is in fact the missing Anastasia, never suspecting that she really is.

Trying to stop her is the evil spectre Rasputin, who becomes so angry that pieces of his face and body fall off and have to be reapplied.

The animators learned their craft at Disney, and it shows. Other than the mostly forgettable score, the production is first-class, with an appealing heroine, exciting action, glamorous settings, and a tender love story. Anna is smart, brave, and loyal. She is also a rare leading lady who vanquishes the bad guy on her own.

Note: kids may be concerned that, having found her grandmother, Anastasia leaves again, not wanting the life of an expatriate princess. Younger kids may be upset by the (offscreen) execution of the Tsar’s family and the scary villain.

Older kids will want to know more about the real story. They may like seeing a live-action (but also fictionalized) version also called “Anastasia,” starring Ingrid Bergman (who won an Oscar), Helen Hayes, and Yul Brynner, or a later version made for television starring Amy Irving.

Watch out — they’re trying to sell this movie as a thriller with supernatural overtones, but it turns out that it is a very traditional love story, and a surprisingly touching one, too.

Jennifer Lopez plays Sharon, a cop who is fearless on the streets but not ready to get close to anyone. As she tells one guy when he tries to get to know her over dinner, “I’m not very good at the whole dating thing,” She goes home to her apartment and lies on her bed in her bulletproof vest.

One day, just as an assailant is about to shoot Sharon, a mysterious stranger (Jim Caviezel) arrives to save her life. She is surprised to find herself drawn to him even though he tells her nothing about himself. All he will tell her is that his name is Catch.

Sharon investigates and interrogates people for a lving. She is not sure how much it is fair to expect to learn about someone in a relationship, so she does not push. In fact, it gives her some breathing room because she does not feel crowded by questions about her own past. She finds something freeing about a relationship between people who have only the present.

The connection between the two of them will be a mystery only to those people who have never seen a movie. But there is an appealing lightness and even a little wisdom the way their relationship unfolds. Sharon calls Catch and when he answers she tells him to hang up so that she can call his machine. She is not comfortable enough to talk to him directly, but at least she is able to tell him that.

Sharon and Catch both have to accept their pasts before they can face the future together. Although it is terrifying, they have to be honest with themselves before they can really be close to each other. Both blame themselves for family tragedies, and both have to accept that it is all right to go on from that. The movie has the great good sense to leave things a little messy.

Maybe Jennifer Lopez should stick with playing cops. This is her best performance since she played a marshall in “Out of Sight.” Caviezel, following roles in “Frequency” and “Pay it Forward,” seems to be the current go-to guy for playing “guys weird stuff happens to.” Screenwriter Gerald DePego and director Luis Mandoki show us the warm, easy connection between Sharon and Catch, and they make it clear that love alone is not the cure, just the motive to allow yourself to heal.

Parents should know that the movie is rated R for very strong language, brief non-explicit nudity and sexual references and situations. Characters are in peril and some are shot. There is a fatal automobile accident and a child is killed offscreen. Sharon jokes that she was looking for a man to “clean her pipes.” There are references to domestic abuse, and we see a woman who has been hit in the face.

Families who see this movie should talk about how we can find a way to create a balance between privacy and intimacy, between mourning a loss and moving on, between trying to make things better and accepting something less than perfect. They may also want to talk about Sharon’s conflicts over how to respond to her father’s abuse of her mother. When Sharon and Catch first become close, she asks him to kiss her somewhere she has never been kissed before — it may be worth discussing with teenagers the importance of keeping yourself precious enough so that you can give the person you love something that is just for the two of you.

Audiences who enjoy this movie will also enjoy some of the classic old romances like “I’ll be Seeing You” with Ginger Rogers and Joseph Cotten, “Love Letters” with Cotten and Jennifer Jones, and “One Way Passage” with William Powell and Kay Francis.

Feivel Mousekewitz is a little Russian mouse who emigrates to the United States with his family, after they are told that “there are no cats in America and the streets are paved with cheese.” He becomes separated from his parents and sister, and is forced to work in a sweatshop by the evil Warren T. Rat (a cat in disguise). Feivel is resilient and courageous, and finds friends (including a kind cat) who help him until he finds his family. The score features the hit song, “Somewhere Out There.”

Families who see this movie should talk about how their own ancestors came to America (or wherever else they settled) and about the immigrant experience.

The sequel, “An American Tail: Feivel Goes West” features the voice of Jimmy Stewart as the slow-talking Sheriff Wylie Burp.