Stuart Little

Directed by Rob Minkoff. Written by M. Night Shyamalan and Greg Booker, based on the book by E.B. White. Running time: 92 minutes. Rated: PG.

Clearly, Hollywood is hot on bringing rodents to the cineplex.

Last week, Stephen King’s Mr. Jingles came to the screen in the film adaptation of “The Green Mile.” This week, the spotlight has turned to another Maine writer’s mouse — E.B. White’s Stuart Little, a cute, animated little furball whose magical tale has several funny moments, but which, in the end, doesn’t survive the ride from book to film nearly as well as King’s “Mile.”

Using White’s story as a starting point, screenwriters M. Night Shyamalan (“The Sixth Sense”) and Greg Booker have reworked White’s 1945 book into a feel-good film of eccentricity which is at its best while steeped in the less literal, yet far more entertaining world of cats — and at its worst when using humans to punctuate the script’s overwhelming chunks of cinematic blue cheese.

“Stuart Little” is about the Littles, a family that wants to adopt a boy so their son George (Jonathan Lipnicki) can have a playmate.

But when Mr. and Mrs. Little (Hugh Laurie and Geena Davis) come back from the orphanage with Stuart (Michael J. Fox), a charming, well-dressed mouse, George is the only one to react with any sort of surprise: “He’s a mouse!”

Indeed he is, and he’s a talking mouse at that, a peculiarity that George, his parents and this film never once address.

“Stuart Little” is so awash in the literal that its intended fairy tale atmosphere never truly comes through.

In spite of its seamless — and superb — special effects, the film is determined to ignore its stunning premise: These people have adopted a talking mouse as their son and yet they’re behaving as if that’s an everyday, unremarkable occurrence. You either want to scream at them or medicate them. It’s a tough call.

Children, however, should have an easier time. This is very much a film for kids, who will be delighted when the film hits its stride with Snowbell (Nathan Lane), the very funny, mean-spirited family cat who asks his alley cat friends Monty (Steve Zhan), Smokey (Chazz Palminteri) and Lucky (Jim Doughan), to do away with Stuart Little so the Littles can once again be his own.

Grade: B-

Bicentennial Man

Directed by Chris Columbus. Written by Nicholas Kazan, based on the short story by Isaac Asimov and the novel “The Positronic Man” by Asimov and Robert Silverberg. Running time: 131 minutes. Rated: PG.

Chris Columbus’ sudsy new film, “Bicentennial Man,” features a woman who falls in love with a household appliance, which might interest those fond of the spin cycle on their washing machines, but others might be left empty.

The film stars Robin Williams, an actor who is becoming the cinematic equivalent of a freshly chopped onion: Audiences know going into one of his movies that Williams is going to try like hell to make them cry.

This isn’t necessarily a good thing, as Williams proved in the wretched “What Dreams May Come” and “Patch Adams,” and now in “Bicentennial Man,” a film that features the actor as a robot desperate to become human over the course of a 200-year journey. (Yes, Williams is perfectly cast.)

In spite of its inspired opening, which does offer a few laughs, what’s disappointing about “Bicentennial Man” isn’t just that Williams and Columbus are so eager to manipulate their audience into a maudlin funk, or that they try to make moviegoers feel something so artificially contrived, or that they rely on the same tricks they pulled off successfully in “Mrs. Doubtfire” (once again, Williams serves a family) — it’s that “Bicentennial Man” confirms just how out of touch Williams has become with his audience.

This man’s career needs a fix — and fast.

Grade: D+

Christopher Smith is the Bangor Daily News film critic. His reviews appear each Monday and Thursday in the NEWS, each Tuesday and Thursday on WLBZ’s “NEWS CENTER 5:30 Today” and “NEWS CENTER Tonight,” and each Saturday and Sunday on NEWS CENTER’s statewide “Morning Report.