And that's fine with me. I'm not interested in clucking over the tastes of American moviegoers. Whatever turns you on, and all that. Let's just say that if you're interested in the question of how many pages of a screenplay can possibly be devoted to a single penis joke, this is a can't-miss opportunity. Forget about the ostensible storyline, which has Austin losing his mojo and his arch-enemy Dr. Evil sending a deadly, Death Star-type weapon into orbit around the earth. The entire aesthetic of Austin Powers 2 consists of setting up a joke, telling us what the joke is, showing us the joke, and then giving us a few seconds to laugh at the joke. Of course, this only works if you think the jokes are funny in the first place. If you're not laughing, it's more than likely you're just getting pissed off.

There's a fundamental problem with timing, the key to good comedy. This film just sorta clunks from scene to scene. Bits that were smutty and funny in the trailer just hit the ground with a thud during the actual movie, given the leaden context in which they appear. The haphazard cultural references are alternately puzzling and tiresome. Yes, the phony Jerry Springer show is slick and accurate, but does anybody want to see more Jerry Springer at this point? (Maybe we could have had Dr. Evil host the show.) And are Jerry Maguire and The Alan Parsons Project such touchstones of pop culture that their mere presence in the script is worth a chuckle?

Another problem is that, although many of the principals from the first film have returned (including director Jay Roach), they haven't brought new ideas with them. The characters, for instance, run out of steam early. While Meyers clearly drives Dr. Evil for maximum pinky-sucking mileage, he has nowhere to go with Austin's character, who seems less like a goofy charmer and more like just some queasy joker with a big mouth and a bad haircut this time around. Another Meyers creation, the largely repulsive Fat Bastard, is the kind of stock character Chris Farley might once have played in an unfunny Hollywood movie. Meyers makes him fat enough, but he can't make him funny.

There's also a woman problem this time around, with the fawning, round-eyed Heather Graham replacing the previous film's immensely watchable Elizabeth Hurley as Austin's leading lady. Hurley was sexy as hell because she was always in on the joke, often with a wry grin on her face. Conpare her to the hapless Graham, who is all breasts and earnestness. Yes, she looks good in the basic sense -- part Emma Peel, part Barbarella. But her screen presence hasn't advanced far from her high-profile appearance as the vacuous-cute Rollergirl in Boogie Nights.

There's an occasional flash of inspiration, as in a bit of lunacy that has the stubby Mini-Me (a tiny replica of Dr. Evil, played by Verne J. Troyer) dancing on a table in the background as Dr. Evil performs "Just the Two of Us" into the camera, a spectacle that could be an inadvertant parody of David Lynch. Dr. Evil is, once again, given the best lines, especially in exchanges with his resolutely disrespectful son, played by a spot-on Seth Green. And it's somehow hard not to like a movie that casts Tim Robbins as the president of the United States and Rob Lowe as Robert Wagner. It's just a shame that so much of everything else is recycled and uninspired. (I had once thought I'd never again have to sit through a parody of the scrolling prologue from the Star Wars movies, but I was wrong.)

Go ahead, accuse me of taking Austin Powers 2 too seriously. I'm guilty as charged, I suppose. But I'll maintain in my own defense that this is a movie that never earns its own stupidity. Yes, there's often pleasure to be found in predictability, in the inexorable unfolding of gags that we can see coming a mile away. But some level of craft can elevate even the lowest common denominator (take a look at There's Something About Mary and Kingpin for examples). I'd even settle for a sense of spontaneity, but it's a little depressing to see a movie that incorporates distracting, ass-kissing commercials (for Heineken, Virgin, Volkswagen and Starbucks) into the film itself rather than having the good graces to save them for the requisite TV spots and billboards. Next to the sponsorship-fattened Meyers and Roach, George Lucas really does look like an independent filmmaker.