Smile Like Yours, A

It is easy to see why Greg Kinnear always looks like he has a tear in his eye. Presumably this movie bored him to tears.

"A Smile Like Yours" follows the adventures of a perky, young yuppie couple, Jennifer (Lauren Holly) and Danny (Kinnear) — who have a perfect marriage, perfect jobs and perfect friends.

A cloud forms over their lives when Jennifer decides she wants to bake cookies for her own children rather than the neighborhood flock. When conventional methods do not work, Jennifer employs alternative methods to become pregnant. This leads to problems in the marriage and countless trips to the fertility clinic.

For anyone who has ever been led into a "masturbatorium" by a 300-pound fertility clinic nurse, the movie might border on comical. But for general audiences the laugh count was about 10, total.

Most of the laughs come fromthe couple's nutty friends, like Joan Cusack ("Grosse Pointe Blank," "Working Girl") as a scent-obsessed aromatherapist. She is the closest the film comes to character development, especially compared to empty-headed Jennifer.

Holly's Jennifer is uniformly annoying in this movie. She plays a character much like Melanie Griffith (in any of her "roles"). She thinks she is adorable and speaks with a whiny, baby-talk voice that is nauseating.

With that perpetual tear in his eye, Kinnear could make an excellent tragedian — but instead, he plays a dull nice guy. He also gets a one-line soliloquy on the subject of his slow-swimming sperm, complete with profanity, which was so out of place it seemed like a commercial break.

Jay Thomas, as Danny's friend Steve, has some funny lines on parenthood, but with such a small part he could hardly save the movie.

There were also a few funny moments when the Robertsons encounter couples at different stages of the fertility-clinic process.

Sadly enough a standout element in "A Smile Like Yours" is the San Francisco scenery. There are gorgeous views of the Golden Gate Bridge and those lovely victorian homes. Something is wrong in a movie like this when scenery stands out more than plot.

Writers Keith Samples and Kevin Meyer seem to think that as long as the romantic comedy rules are followed (a sweet, simple couple tries to solve a problem with the help of their zany friends), a movie will inevitably be charming and hilarious.

In this case the formula was undone by dull performances and a very unsurprising script. Unless you have been through the fertility clinic loop, you'll have no need for a smile like yours while watching this movie.

"A Smile Like Yours" is rated R for profanity, vulgarity and implied sex.