In theaters

AMERICA’S SWEETHEARTS, 100 minutes, PG-13, directed by Joe Roth, written by Billy Crystal and Peter Tolan.

In the new Joe Roth film, “America’s Sweethearts,” Billy Crystal stars as Lee Phillips, a Hollywood public relations vet trying to get America’s sweethearts, Gwen Harrison (Catherine Zeta-Jones) and Eddie Thomas (John Cusack), to kiss and make up before the press screens their new movie, “Time Over Time.”

The studio’s thinking is this: If Lee can somehow create the illusion that Gwen and Eddie are back together again – their marriage ended when Gwen began an affair with the lisping Latin heartthrob, Hector (Hank Azaria) – their $86 million movie might generate renewed interest in the tarnished couple and help the studio earn a profit.

It’s a promising premise, but one that quickly reveals itself to be less than stellar when Lee visits Gwen’s Hollywood home. There, while trying to get her to agree to attend the film’s press junket, he’s subjected to the baser instincts of Gwen’s horny Doberman pinscher, which buries its head between Phillips’ legs.

The scene doesn’t work – at my screening, the audience remained rooted to their seats in a sort of bewildered, uncomfortable silence – but the scene is nevertheless important for what it says about the state of American comedies and what audiences can expect in the future.

Indeed, if respected A-list actors such as Crystal are willing to humiliate themselves a la Tom Green, how many other actors are willing to do the same?

There’s John Cusack for one, who hits a career low by miming a questionable act of self-pleasure. And then there’s Catherine Zeta-Jones, who discusses her disgust and disappointment in the brevity of Hector’s “manhood.”

When done well, a little raunch can be fun; the taboo-bashing is liberating. But there’s been so much of it lately in so many bad films, it seems as though we’ll never get a reprieve. Has wit gone out the window? In this film, it has, and it’s maddening.

What’s so disappointing about “America’s Sweethearts” is that in spite of being co-written by one of our sharpest comedians, Billy Crystal, it feels as if nobody even tried to sweep wit through the door.

As Gwen’s sister and much-beleaguered personal assistant, Kiki, Julia Roberts is the film’s only sympathetic character, but her performance, such as it is, is lost amidst the tepid writing, Roth’s lackluster direction and the sheer overacting of her co-stars.

She isn’t asked to do much here and so she doesn’t; for a good deal of the movie, she’s just there, tolerating Gwen’s outbursts, dealing with Gwen’s demands, rising above Gwen’s dizzying histrionics while trying to make everything all so codependently right.

In a recent Entertainment Weekly article, Roberts admitted she took the film’s supporting role because “I don’t have to work as much.” She wasn’t kidding. Every actor relies on his or her bag of tricks, but for this movie, Roberts seems to have crawled into the bag and made a home of it.

One of her tricks is her smile, which has changed over the years and become slightly mechanical, as if somebody is standing off camera and yanking at the corners of her mouth with invisible string. Throughout “Sweethearts,” Roberts waits for just the right moment to flash that smile and thus, in theory, to light up the screen. But some wonder that with a smile so big, why isn’t there any light in Roberts’ eyes?

The film is supposed to be buoyed by the romance that eventually builds between Kiki and Eddie, but since Roberts and Cusack have no chemistry – Haley Joel Osment had more with his animatronic teddy bear in “A.I.” – the romance that’s supposed to lift the film ultimately sinks it.

We depend on the A-list crowd to choose the best scripts, to respect the audience and the art of film, and to give us something that doesn’t look as if everyone involved is just showing up for a paycheck. But as “America’s Sweethearts” unfolds, it becomes clear that its cast, which has proved itself time and again in better films, is only coasting. They’re mocking a film that’s mocking an industry that’s making them rich. The point never comes when the movie transcends that irony – and it’s difficult not to feel your own heart sink because of it.

Grade: D+

Christopher Smith is the Bangor Daily News film critic. His reviews appear Mondays in Style, Thursdays in the scene, Tuesdays on “NEWS CENTER at 5” and Thursdays on “NEWS CENTER at 5:30” on WLBZ-2 and WCSH-6. He can be reached at BDNFilm1@aol.com.

THE VIDEO CORNER

Renting a video? NEWS film critic Christopher Smith can help. Below are his grades of recent releases in video stores.

Pollock ? A-

Sweet November ? D-

Valentine ? F

The Gift ? B+

Family Man ? D-

Saving Silverman ? F

Down to Earth ? D

Monkeybone ? D

Thirteen Days ? A-

The Wedding

Planner ? D+

Unbreakable ? C+

You Can Count on Me ? A

Proof of Life ? C-

Save the Last Dance ? C-

State and Main ? B

O Brother,

Where Art Thou ? A-

Cast Away ? A-

Crouching Tiger,

Hidden Dragon ? A+

The House Of Mirth ? B

Shadow of the

Vampire ? B+

Traffic ? A

Antitrust ? D

Before Night Falls ? A

Best in Show ? A

Requiem for a Dream ? A

Vertical Limit ? B-

Pay it Forward ? C

Duets ? D

Quills ? B

What Women Want ? B

Yi Yi ? A

All the Pretty Horses ? C-

Miss Congeniality ? B

The Emperor’s

New Groove ? A-

Little Nicky ? F

One Day in

September ? B+

Bamboozled ? B+

Finding Forrester ? B+

The Ladies Man ? D+

Bounce ? B+

Men of Honor ? C-