The Stepford Wives is a remake...a re-imagining...a reg....Oh let's just face it folks--it's a pile of crap. And it's too bad really, because I've always felt that the original was a cult classic of sorts. After watching this new version, I was completely struck-dumb as to how to describe how seriously dumb this regurgitation is.

In The Stepford Wives, Nicole Kidman is Joanna Eberhart, a quirky, but headstrong woman who is looking to start a new life after losing her job as a television programmer. She and her nebbish husband (played by Matthew Broderick) move to the strange town of Stepford, a high class neighborhood populated by domineering men and their rather odd wives, who love them desperately and seem to cater to them hand and foot.

In record time Joanna begins to despise this slave new world and as desperately as she wants to leave, her husband has suddenly become just as adamant about staying. Seems he's taken quite a shine to Stepford. This uncharacteristically more assertive side of her husband is just fascinating enough to placate Joanna for a time and she does try to make the best of these strange new circumstances, (curiosity killed the cat). Yet slowly, but surely she begins to smell a rat in the perfectly cozy little suburb of Stepford.

It's been a tough road for this dark comedy from director Frank Oz (voice of Yoda). As the film was shooting, it had been widely reported that it was a problem plagued set. John Cusack left the project early and was replaced by Broderick, and there were also rumors of a clash between Oz and some of the film's stars. Of course, if this movie were any good, I wouldn't be bringing any of this stuff up. But since it's such a trainwreck, the behind the scenes turmoil seems infinitely more interesting than the film itself.

This updated remade mess is an absolute disaster. The original Stepford Wives was odd to be sure, but the strangeness of the that film gave it a fun sort of Rosemary's Baby sort of creepy appeal and unconsciously so. This spifffed up new version is so intentionally campy that it shoots itself in the foot trying to be funny and stumbles step after Stepford for an agonizing hour. I believe I remember laughing once and that might have been at something someone in the audience yelled.

The film's opening is particularly odd as Kidman's Joanna seems far stranger than any of the Stepford Wives, and she's supposed to be normal. The way she talks, walks and carries herself suggest that she's constantly doped up. So much so in fact, that I thought the beginning of the film was actually the ending, and that the story would be told through a flashback. I was convinced that she had already suffered the same fate as The Stepford Wives. Alas, this wasn't the case. The beginning of the movie was in fact the beginning. And Joanna, as it turns out, is just that weird.

In all fairness, Kidman is quite appealing. She's incredibly odd and I really forgot that I was watching her. Had the screenplay moved in any kind of sensible and cohesive direction, there could have been enormous potential for this stunning actress. Alas, everything falls apart. At least she makes an effort. The rest of the cast is completely wasted. Matthew Broderick is dull, granted that's the way the character was written I suppose. Faith Hill is gorgeous, but she spends the entire film walking around smiling and making martinis and fetching slippers, as written. Towards the end of the picture, I thought she would be given an opportunity to show some dramatic chops but that never happens. Bette Midler is Bette Midler. She's lively, but hardly memorable. Glenn Close appears to be having a fun time, but her eccentricities wear thin within the first half of the movie. The biggest shock comes in the form of the brilliant Christopher Walken. Usually, this guy is the life of the party. He's able to take the crummiest dialogue and make it work under the worst of circumstances. Sadly, not even CW can salvage this material.

Frank Oz takes a somewhat dark approach to the material, but the mean spirited elements of the film aren't even mean. They're just boring. And the varying tones that it flashes back and forth between are wildly uneven. What's more, there seems to be huge chunks of the plot missing. Thirty minutes into this picture, I didn't give a crap where it was going, and the climax is quite predictable save for a double twist that I will confess I didn't really see coming. The film as a whole, however, is so disjointed and so incredibly dull that I just wanted to get out of the theater as quickly as possible.

Frank Oz has made some terrific films (see Little Shop of Horrors and Dirty Rotten Scoundrels). Unfortunately The Stepford Wives certainly isn't one of them. I got the joke--it just wasn't funny. This isn't Duplex or Death to Smoochy bad (sorry to blast your last two pictures Mr. DeVito) but it is still a movie I'm going to desperately try to forget.