Originality sleeps with the fishes

Cue Jaws theme. Prepare for Shark attack.Shark Tale, the computer-animated comedy from the team that brought you Shrek, bites. As in hook, line and stinker.

An inventory of movie references and ethnic jokes in shimmering color, Shark Tale tickles younger kids (my 8-year-old liked it) as it reinforces stereotypes their parents would rather smash. Inside this dazzling animation is a dim plot that imagines Goodfellas living in the land of Jaws and being serviced by the dudes at the Car Wash.

In this sociology of the sea, a godfather shark named Don Lino (voice of Robert De Niro) preys on the underwater population while pushing his gentle vegetarian son, Lenny (voice of Jack Black), to prove his sharkhood. Meaning: Kill, then eat, the littler fish.

At the other end of the food chain is Oscar (voice of Will Smith), a bottom-feeding wrasse who works at the whale wash (cue Car Wash theme), speaks scuba jive, and dreams of the high life at the top of the reef. When Oscar exploits an undersea accident to look as though he killed Don Lino's other son, the wrasse enjoys his 15 minutes as "The Shark Slayer" before realizing that scamming and shamming aren't for him.

There are those who would have you believe that this movie is DreamWorks' latest raid in a war with Pixar. To these observers, the insect world was the first battlefield, when DreamWorks' Antz fought Pixar's a bug's life at the box office in 1998. Then came the monster mash with DreamWorks' Shrek vs. Pixar's Monsters, Inc. in 2001. The conspiracy theorists may have a point in that Shark Tale lifts the comic conflict of a vegetarian shark straight from Pixar's Finding Nemo.

Comparing the oceanic depths of Nemo with the spoofy shallows of Shark is like comparing De Niro's serious performances in Godfather II and Goodfellas to his parodies thereof in Analyze This and Shark Tale.

Despite its buoyant R&B soundtrack and the energetic vocal talents of Smith, De Niro, Black, Martin Scorsese (as a blowfish), and Renée Zellweger, who supplies the voice for Angie, Oscar's guardian angelfish, Shark sinks in a sea of product placement and cross-referential humor.

The recognizable brands that provided comic background for Shrek 2 are thrust onto center stage here, as the products of Gup (as in Gap), Old Navy and Kelpy Kreme (Krispy Kreme) are flogged shamelessly.

Even more shameless is the paucity of original dialogue. The characters don't have their own words, but those of beloved movie characters. As Oscar, Smith spouts familiar lines from Gladiator and A Few Good Men, and when he runs out of words he steals from his own film, Ali. When Zellweger quotes from her character in Jerry Maguire, she lost me at hello.

Shark's one flight of actual imagination involves Lenny's slathering himself in blue paint in order to cross-dress as a dolphin. Do sharks dream of wave-riding with the surfers rather than eating them for breakfast?

Where Finding Nemo suggested that under-the-waves adventure was limitless, Shark Tale suggests that this sea is over-fished. The krill is gone.

Contact movie critic Carrie Rickey at 215-854-5402 or crickey@phillynews.com.

Shark Tale ** (out of four stars)

Produced by Bill Damaschke, Janet Healy and Allison Lyon Segan, directed by Vicky Jenson, Bibo Bergeron and Rob Letterman, written by Letterman and Michael J. Wilson, music by Hans Zimmer, distributed by DreamWorks Animation.

Running time: 1 hour, 30 mins.

Oscar. . . Voice of Will Smith

Don Lino. . . Voice of Robert De Niro

Angie. . . Voice of Renée Zellweger

Lenny. . . Voice of Jack Black

Parent's guide: PG (crude humor, double entendres)

Playing at: area theaters