OK, we're in Pee-wee Herman territory here. Despite the 2 1/2-star rating, be advised that your enjoyment of "UHF" is going to be predicated entirely on your fondness for "Weird Al" Yankovic, he of the bizarre, often hilarious music parodies, accompanied by even wackier videos.

The main problem here is that "UHF" is a skit film and skit films are notoriously hard to endure for feature length. As with any such movie, many of the skits here are very funny, but just as many tend to fall flat.

Yankovic, in his big-screen acting debut (he has done cameos in other movies from time to time), plays a nerd who can't hold a job. So when he and his best friend (David Bowe) are fired from a hamburger joint, they are given an opportunity in the form of a failing TV station.

But they can't get the ratings to rise with the programming of such reruns as "Mr. Ed," so they inadvertently get their first hit by letting the janitor (Michael Richards) take over a kiddie show, since the janitor is just weird enough that people start tuning in, never knowing what he'll do next. Soon they discover that the more offensive the program is, the better the ratings.

This naturally angers the top network affiliate in town and its bone-headed boss (Kevin McCarthy), who sets out to shut down Yankovic's station.

This is the plot — a sort of "Network" spoof — but "UHF" hardly relies on it. Mostly the film is made up of the crazy shows Yankovic and Bowe come up with and Yankovic's daydreams.

So we have such skits as "Conan the Librarian," "Spatula City," a parody of the computer-animated music video "Money For Nothing" combined with the theme from "The Beverly Hillbillies" and wild takeoffs on "Ghandi," "Raiders of the Lost Ark" and "Rambo."

My favorite moments are the little throwaway bits, such as the TV schedule that includes a soap opera called "The Young and the Dyslexic" and Yankovic making himself a Twinkie hot dog.

There are also some funny supporting players, such as Gedde Watanabe as the host of the game show "Wheel of Fish," Anthony Geary as a spaced-out mad scientist, and the aforementioned Richards, who is hilarious as the janitor-cum-kiddie-show-host.

But there are many skits that seem stale, movie parodies that seem to have already been overdone or are simply too late in the game, some comic violence — however silly — that owes a bit too much to the Monty

Python gang and a terrible waste of Victoria Jackson, the "SaturdayNight Live" regular who plays Yankovic's girlfriend.

After all, to Yankovic his first album title — "Dare to Be Stupid" — isn't just a phrase. It's a challenge. And in "UHF" he meets it.

"UHF" is rated PG-13, mainly for the blood-spurting comic violence, along with a few vulgar gags. But there is nothing sexual and no profanity.