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If state-of-the-art cross-gender fat suits and drunken Chihuahuas were the stuff of comic genius, "Big Momma's House 2" still wouldn't be very funny. But as few and far between as the laughs are, this follow-up to the 2000 comedy -- painted in the same broad, no-thinking-required strokes -- is likely to score the same solid business.

Greg Cannom's makeup effects again take center stage, and Martin Lawrence is game as the FBI agent who goes undercover as a very large grandmother. It's the Chihuahua, though, that delivers one of the more committed performances, no doubt because he hadn't read the script.

After saving Nia Long from the formidable Terrence Howard in the first film, agent Malcolm Turner here merely has to save America from techno-terrorists. He has married Sherri (Long) and traded in his field agent responsibilities for a PR desk job, making local school appearances as a "safety eagle," much to the embarrassment of his stepson (Jascha Washington). But after learning that his first partner has been killed while working on a computer-worm case, Malcolm dons the Big Momma costume and goes undercover without telling the agency or his 8 1/2-months-pregnant wife.

To get to the suspected designer of that worm, which would give its dastardly users access to the U.S. government's intelligence network (assuming the old-school Luddites have created one by now), Big Momma gets herself hired as nanny to the family of an Orange County software exec (Mark Moses). Don Rhymer's screenplay takes some deserved, if obvious, jabs at the new-millennial brand of parenting that churns out overachieving competitors rather than children. But while Emily Procter fits the bill as an activity-obsessed mom, painfully unfunny slapstick takes precedence over would-be satire.

Under the helm of John Whitesell, a veteran of episodic television whose big-screen credits include "Calendar Girl" and "Malibu's Most Wanted", the story unspools with a decided lack of comic energy, wending its way toward the tepid better-parenting message that has plagued more than a few comedies in recent years. Amid some of the lamest FBI maneuvers ever seen, the warmed-over "Mrs. Doubtfire" premise has our hero discovering his maternal instinct while saving the Western world, reconnecting poor little rich kids with their distracted parents, putting the booty in the moves of a clueless white girls' cheerleading squad and helping the grieving family dog find his bliss.

Lawrence has the devilish schoolboy look that makes you wish he'd cut loose more, but the film doesn't embrace the downright ludicrousness of the scenario until the climactic collision with the villains. And then it promptly goes all mushy. Josh Flitter, who made an impression as the mouthy pint-size caddie in "The Greatest Game Ever Played" and who appears to be channeling Jack E. Leonard, injects some oomph as a hacker extraordinaire who helps the hapless FBI agents. Design and other production contributions serve the story in straight-ahead fashion.

BIG MOMMA'S HOUSE 2

20th Century Fox

20th Century Fox and Regency Enterprises present

a Deep River/Firm Films/Runteldat Entertainment/New Regency production

Credits:

Director: John Whitesell

Screenwriter: Don Rhymer

Based on the characters created by: Darryl Quarles

Producers: David T. Friendly, Michael Green

Executive producers: Martin Lawrence, Jeffrey Kwatinetz, Arnon Milchan

Director of photography: Mark Irwin

Production designer: Craig Stearns

Music: George S. Clinton

Co-producer: Jeremiah Samuels

Special makeup effects: Greg Cannom

Costume designer: Debrae Little

Editor: Priscilla Nedd Friendly

Cast:

Malcolm/Big Momma: Martin Lawrence

Sherri: Nia Long

Leah Fuller: Emily Procter

Kevin: Zachary Levi

Tom Fuller: Mark Moses

Molly: Kat Dennings

Carrie: Chloe Grace Moretz

Liliana Morales: Marisol Nichols

Stewart: Josh Flitter

Crawford: Dan Lauria

Trent: Jascha Washington

Andrew: Preston Shores, Trevor Shores

Constance: Sarah Joy Brown

MPAA rating PG-13

Running time -- 99 minutes...