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  EW review: 'Big Momma,' few laughsAlso: Repetitive 'Nanny,' cliched 'Annapolis'By Nicholas Fonseca  Martin Lawrence does his Bo Derek imitation in "Big Momma's House 2." YOUR E-MAIL ALERTS(Entertainment Weekly) -- It's taken Martin Lawrence six years to resurrect Hattie Mae Pierce, the zaftig alter ego of FBI agent Malcolm Turner, who again goes undercover -- this time as a nanny spying on Tom Fuller ("Desperate Housewives' " Mark Moses), a father of three who's created a computer worm that could threaten homeland security. That flimsy plot is the one nod to timeliness in "Big Momma's House 2"; otherwise, this unnecessary but genial comedy's yuks are firmly steeped in the ways of Y2K. An adorable Chihuahua that looks like it wandered in from the set of an old Taco Bell commercial gets drunk on tequila. Momma chases a perp along an ocean boardwalk before hopping onto a Segway. And the final scenes, in a pale imitation of 2000's already-too-satirized "Bring It On," take place at a tween cheer competition. What, you were expecting originality from a Martin Lawrence sequel? "House 2" may never elicit more than mild chuckles, but when Momma teaches the Fullers a few lessons about family, it's heartfelt without being syrupy. And Lawrence -- thundering down the beach in cornrows and a yellow swimsuit -- yet again proves that there is no such thing as an unfunny "10" parody. EW Grade: C+ 'Nanny McPhee'Reviewed by Owen Gleiberman "Nanny McPhee" is one of those raucous, hyperactive kiddie flicks that knocks you upside the head from its opening frame. In England, a handsome widower (Colin Firth) lives with his seven children, who are such brats that they've driven away 17 nannies, and the British toddler mischief gets shoved at the audience with wide-angle-lens coarseness, for that maximum annoying impact. Then, as the storm clouds gather, a magical new nanny arrives from up in the air. We're cued to expect Mary Poppins, but instead, in walks Nanny McPhee (Emma Thompson), who has a witchy pair of facial warts, a hideous unibrow, a nose scuzzy and bulbous enough to belong to an ancient drunk, and a single bucktooth that hangs over her lower lip like a misnailed floorboard. Yes, it's the tough-love Mary Poppins. When the children fake measles, their new governess bangs her polished tree branch of a walking stick on the ground, and voila! -- they really get measles. The only cure is to swallow a supergross spoonful of what looks like squirmy live castor oil. Thompson wrote the script for "Nanny McPhee," adapting it from Christianna Brand's Nurse Matilda books, and she plays the title role with her familiar saucy inflections, letting that voice undercut McPhee's ugly-duckling appearance. Each time she teaches the kids a new lesson, a different flaw vanishes from her face. Yet there remains an odd glimmer of masochism to Thompson's portrayal. After a while, the film introduces a new cartoon wretch -- a powdered harridan who seems to have wandered in from a road production of "Barry Lyndon: The Musical." She's out to make Firth into her husband, and the movie, which is already too repetitive and too damn grotty, becomes about as appealing as a stale crumpet. EW Grade: C 'Annapolis'Reviewed by Gregory Kirschling If, 90 minutes in, we were holding out hope that Louis Gossett Jr. might kick Richard Gere's sorry ass out of the Navy already, would "An Officer and a Gentleman" still have connected? Probably not. Basic-training dramas, a diverting genre, work because they ultimately pit right against right: It doesn't seem quite fair that Gere has to do all those sit-ups, but then again, it's the military and Gossett's there to play tough. You respect both sides equally, if perhaps grudgingly, and eagerly pull up your seats for the tug-of-war. Not so, alas, in "Annapolis," a military drama that errs big by making its new recruit -- a ship-builder named Jake Huard (James Franco) who goes from the wait list into the U.S. Naval Academy -- too much the rebel. If you're gonna make a movie about a maverick in a military-school setting, that movie better be "Top Gun." Here, Huard's rule breaking is more exasperating than exhilarating. Compellingly reserved and inscrutable at the start, Franco starts to lose us by the second hour, when his character's still not showing up for roll call on time, and isn't charismatic enough to bring us over to his side. Finally, when -- not so far from the end credits -- Huard blindsides his commanding officer, the stern-jawed Lieutenant Cole (Tyrese Gibson), for the second time, that's when you start longing for Gossett to pop up and boot this kid out so we can all head home. "Annapolis" manages to hit some nice basic-training movie beats. The best comes when a smiley CO played by Jordana Brewster orders Franco to ''Drop and give me 20!'' -- exactly what Kelly LeBrock barked at a bunch of dorks in the last scene of "Weird Science." The male fantasy lives on. EW Grade: C+ 'Imagine Me & You'Reviewed by Lisa Schwarzbaum The positively untrue story of a bride who falls in love with a woman while walking down the aisle becomes, in this age of "The L Word," merely a charming utopian sexual complication in "Imagine Me & You." Pretty Rachel (Piper Perabo, inhabiting the Gwyneth Paltrow neighborhood of British accents) is happy enough with her handsome groom, Heck ("Match Point's" Matthew Goode). It's wedding florist Luce (Lena Headey), however, who catches Rachel's eye, one mascaraed soul mate finding another in fairy-tale fashion. Not that there's anything wrong with that -- but neither is there any real proof of life-changing Ms.-on-Ms. Rightness provided by first-time British writer-director Ol Parker. Actually, "Love Actually's" style DNA exerts far more influence on the chemistry of this blithely synthetic romantic comedy than meaningful sexual identity. Every supporting character, including Luce's depressed mum, Rachel's squabbling parents, and Heck's horndog best pal, is introduced for color rather than consequence. Congratulations are in order for Rachel's sexual awakening, but we might as well applaud the dull girl for falling in love with the nearest bunch of lilies rather than the florist. EW Grade: C 'Tristram Shandy: A Cock & Bull Story'Reviewed by Lisa Schwarzbaum Laurence Sterne's bawdy, untamable, altogether astonishing 18th-century novel "The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman" stands proud on the shelf of great books famous for being owned wisely but not read too much. Posited as the fictional autobiography of an eccentric English gent, the book is a cavalcade of digressions, narrative fractures, and formal messing-about that predates (and outdazzles) postmodern literary gamesmanship by centuries and miles. It is, safe to say, unfilmable. And yet here it is, filmed to perfection by Michael Winterbottom as "Tristram Shandy: A Cock & Bull Story" -- the first great, mind-tickling treat of the new movie year. But, as the carnival barker promises, that's not all! In a fit of irresistible playfulness, the filmmaker operates at a level of addictive challenge known to Sudoku puzzle players as ''diabolical.'' Working off a wonderfully sparkling screenplay, Winterbottom creates a narrative not only about the loquacious Tristram Shandy (Steve Coogan), who tells the story of his own birth and odd family, but also about the making of the very movie we are watching. Coogan (a brilliant Brit comedian known in the U.S. as that actor from "Coffee and Cigarettes," but a certified comic genius and celebrity at home, forever identified with his shallow fictional chat-show alter ego Alan Partridge) plays actor Steve Coogan, a certified comic genius and celebrity, etc. The fictional star is as vain, shallow, pompous, and distractable a showbiz fellow off camera as his Tristram is in waistcoat and wig; for him, a half-inch height advantage, built into his shoes, is crucial to his notion of character development. This Steve Coogan ignores his gentle girlfriend (Kelly Macdonald) and their infant son who visit him on location, argues with the director (Jeremy Northam) and screenwriter (Ian Hart), and competes childishly with his costar Rob Brydon (hilarious fellow comedian Rob Brydon), who plays the role of Tristram's Uncle Toby. His character has, it's safe to say, never bothered to read the book on which his movie is based. This Steve Coogan is a petty man who represents the movie biz at its most risible, an industry type ripe for parody; he's also a marvelous -- indeed deeply apt -- incarnation of everything Sterne's fictional hero embodies, all appetites, insecurities, and vigors. The movie-within-a-movie conceit isn't new, and neither is the parodic notion of the movie-about-the-business-of-making-movies. But rarely has such meta-ness been put to such deep and insightful literary use, or handled with such heart. A knowing chronicle of cock and bull in all its forms and charms, the movie swings with inventive pleasures, the work of a protean filmmaker who thrives on experimentation ("9 Songs," "In This World," "24 Hour Party People," "Welcome to Sarajevo" -- no Winterbottom project is like any other). Eventually, Gillian Anderson shows up as Gillian Anderson, cast last minute for a romantic subplot. A real New York Times reporter on set to interview Winterbottom about "9 Songs" gets cast as a NYT reporter. And the prospect of reading Laurence Sterne beckons as a reward -- the very opposite of homework. EW Grade: A Click Here 
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