In theaters

Rat Race. Directed by Jerry Zucker. Written by Andy Breckman. 112 minutes. Rated PG-13.

After an uninspired opening that establishes a been-there, laughed-at-that premise, Jerry Zucker’s “Rat Race” builds to one of the more outrageously funny comedies to come out of Hollywood this year.

It knows exactly what it wants to be – a silly screwball chase movie modeled after Stanley Kramer’s “It’s a Mad Mad Mad Mad World,” Blake Edwards’ “The Great Race” and the Mack Sennett comedies of the silent era.

What’s better? Unlike so many recent comedies, from the dispiriting “Freddy Got Fingered” to the current snotfest “Osmosis Jones,” “Rat Race” doesn’t dip long and deep into the toilet bowl to pluck out its laughs. Instead, its comedy hinges on a series of nonstop sight gags, many of which had the audience at my screening literally in tears.

The cast – including John Cleese, Whoopi Goldberg, Jon Lovitz, Rowan Atkinson, Cuba Gooding Jr., Seth Green, Lanai Chapman, Kathy Bates and Breckin Meyer – is in fine form, taking to the screen with an eagerness that suggests they’re more than up for the considerable absurdities Andy Breckman is shucking in his script.

In the film, a group of people staying at a Las Vegas hotel get the chance to win $2 million, which an eccentric casino owner played by Cleese has stuffed into a duffel bag and hidden 700 miles away in Silver City, N.M. To the highways and byways these people flee, losing along the way their sanity, their tempers, their lunches and – more often than not – their self-respect.

Zucker, who first hit the collective funny bone as one of the co-directors of “Airplane!” and “Ruthless People” before moving on to direct “Ghost” and “First Knight” on his own, deftly keeps things moving with an energy that only sputters toward the end, which is a misstep.

Still, there’s much to be admired here. Whether Zucker is featuring Goldberg and Chapman in a runaway rocket car that breaks the sound barrier, Lovitz drugging his family after he convinces them to steal Hitler’s car, or Gooding running from a wailing band of Lucille Ball impersonators, the film’s increasingly insane tone is sustained with hilarious results.

Grade: B+

On Video and DVD

Hannibal. Directed by Ridley Scott. Written by David Mamet and Steven Zaillian. 131 minutes. Rated R.

There’s something to be said for the containment of evil: Keep it rooted to a confined space – such as a tiny basement cell below the dark recesses of a mental institution – and that evil can fill up a screen rather nicely.

But if that same evil is let loose and allowed to wander along the fringes of a larger landscape – such as the gorgeous, less-threatening streets of Florence, Italy – it can exhaust itself in its effort to spark an atmosphere of fear.

Ridley Scott’s “Hannibal” is a textbook example of this. As beautifully shot, scored, and as witty as it sometimes is, the film, based on Thomas Harris’ best-selling novel, his third to feature the gruesomely well-mannered serial killer Hannibal Lecter (Anthony Hopkins), fails to drum up much tension in its two-hour running time.

While the decision to set Lecter free gave the ending of “The Silence of the Lambs” a fantastic kick (just imagine the havoc the man could wreak in the outside world) the realization of his freedom in “Hannibal” is a disappointment.

Indeed, those expecting “Hannibal” to be a sharply paced, unrelenting thriller reminiscent of “Lambs” should take note – more often than not, the movie is so mired in police and FBI procedures, it’s something of a sophisticated bore.

What’s worse? Without giving too much away, Lecter and Clarice – now played with a steely determination by Julianne Moore – spend only about 25 minutes onscreen together. When they do meet, it does lift the film, if only because audiences have been waiting 10 years for their reunion. But, because “Hannibal” is more concerned with the guts of its plot than the soul of its characters, their meeting doesn’t boost the film enough.

With Gary Oldman in a terrific performance as the fabulously wealthy and horrifically disfigured Mason Verger, Lecter’s only victim to have survived and the man now determined to make him pay, “Hannibal” isn’t without its pleasures – it’s just that the dish it offers is rather cheap, one that would be better served with a box of Merlot and a plate of refried beans than the previous film’s more famous Epicurean fare.

Grade: C+

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.