Here's a surefire way to invigorate the sagging James Bond franchise: Give us more Halle Berry. And less Pierce Brosnan.

Now if only someone had told the makers of "Die Another Day." . . .

After 40 years and 20 films, the Bond movies have lost their ability to surprise. With an increasingly disinterested-looking Brosnan starring as 007, they're also starting to lose the ability to thrill. Which is why the latest film is fortunate to have Berry's sexy supporting character, a wild card named Jinx, who is anything but. In fact, she provides the film with a necessary spark that is sorely lacking every time she goes AWOL. Thanks to her, at least this entry is a step above the previous installment, the low-brow, lower-rent "The World is Not Enough."

This time around, suave superspy James Bond (Brosnan) finds himself captured and interrogated for more than a year by the North Korean army. After his release, even Bond's boss (Judi Dench) has her suspicions about his loyalty. So Bond decides to take revenge on the person he blames for this turn of events — a North Korean terrorist named Zao (Rick Yune), who was horribly scarred in their last encounter.

Joining him is Jinx, who has motives of her own for tracking down Zao and his boss, Gustav Graves (Toby Stephens), a diamond dealer who has created a satellite named Icarus, which has the ability to create artificial sunlight across the Earth.

The Bond films never make sense, but some of the plot twists here are ludicrous even by the usual standards. Also, the film is loaded with more of the last film's style of cornball one-liners and sexual banter (please ditch longtime screenwriters Robert Wade and Neal Purvis already).

Still, director Lee Tamahori does his best to keep the action coming fast and furious — even if some of the stunts are performed with surprisingly phony looking CGI effects.

As for the star, Brosnan seems to be having a hard time keeping up with Berry, who's clearly having a blast. On the supporting side, Stephens (son of actress Maggie Smith) is over-the-top, while newcomer Rosamund Pike fails to deliver any of the Grace Kellyish charms promised by her startling resemblance to the late actress/princess. (On the plus side, John Cleese does manage to steal a pair of scenes as Bond's sarcastic gadget supplier, Q.)

"Die Another Day" is rated PG-13 for wall-to-wall action violence (hand-to-hand combat, fencing, gunplay and explosive mayhem), scenes of torture (in the opening title sequence), vulgar sex talk (double-entendres), scenes of simulated sex, sporadic use of strong profanity, veiled nudity (also in the title sequence), brief drugs (tranquilizers, injected) and brief gore. Running time: 132 minutes.

---

E-MAIL: jeff@desnews.com