Are we done yet? Alas, 92 minutes to go

Are We Done Yet?

is a sequel to Ice Cube's family comedy

Are We There Yet?

It is also an acknowledged remake of the 1948 Cary Grant movie

Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House

. As far as I could tell, that's because everyone involved was inspired by the syllable "Bland" in the title.

No cleverness was exerted on this one. Cube's Nick Persons, who has married the mother (Nia Long) of the two obnoxious kids from There and will soon be the father of twins, needs a bigger place for his growing brood. So he buys a lovely Victorian in the Oregon countryside - and soon finds that everything about the place needs to be redone at great expense by eccentric subcontractors. To make this vaguely humorous, a chandelier falls on the dinner table, and the dry-rot guys are Hawaiian. A kindergarten class could have written these jokes.

The wiring, plumbing, roofing and other work is supposed to metaphorically represent the difficult task of creating a home - i.e., making the new domestic unit work. The thing is, Nick's already a pretty good husband and father to start with, and the way Cube underplays him, there's no urgency to either his emotional or homeowner's crises. I know Cube's supposed to be cool, and his trademark scowl is intact throughout much of the proceedings. But there's something lifeless about even Nick's few angry outbursts. It's like the rapper who made his bones with N.W.A. got busted, did hard time, and had all the fight knocked out if him.

Similarly, the bratty children, 13-year-old Lindsey (Aleisha Allen) and 8-year-old Kevin (Philip Daniel Bolden), are much better-behaved this time around. That's a mercy for those who considered There more of an endurance test than a comedy. But it doesn't help the sequel generate sparks.

Royal-pain duties are taken up here by Scrubs' John C. McGinley. His hyperactive character Chuck is not only the real-estate agent who sells Nick the decrepit house, he's the local building inspector, repairs honcho, midwife, and just about everyone else the Personses have to go through to get anything done. As if to compensate for his costar's low wattage, McGinley plays every scene at a high, mega-mugging pitch - which is not the same thing as actually being funny.

Anyway, Nick has to come to terms with this maniac, much as he does with his new family, because - well, I dunno, because that was kind of the formula for the previous film? Personally, I would have been much more satisfied if Nick whomped the stuffing out of this crooked, gibbering annoyance.

Are We Done Yet? reunites Cube with his Next Friday director, Steve Carr, something which the world has anxiously been waiting for. Having honed his chops on such Eddie Murphy masterpieces as Daddy Day Care and Dr. Dolittle 2, Carr nonetheless manages to stage a good owl gag and a nicely antic childbirth sequence. But the rest - anthropomorphic animal bits that go nowhere, carpentry slapstick that's about as sophisticated as hitting a thumb with a hammer - is just space filler.

There is only one flatulence joke and just a single butt-crack shot, so I guess you could say that the movie has a certain degree of class. But that just makes this kind of thing duller.

Directed by Steve Carr, written by Hank Nelkin, cinematography by Jack L. Green, music by Teddy Castellucci, distributed by Sony Pictures Entertainment.

Running time: 1 hour, 31 mins.

Nick Persons . . . Ice Cube

Suzanne Persons . . . Nia Long

Chuck Mitchell Jr. . . . John C. McGinley

Lindsey Persons . . . Aleisha Allen

Parent's guide: PG (mild violence, partial nudity)

Showing at: area theatersEndText