Baby On Board

Stars: Judge Reinhold (Black Magic, Beverly Hills Cop, Ruthless People, Over Her Dead Body), Carol Kane (Hester Street, The Lemon Sisters, My Blue Heaven). When a hit man accidentally whacks Maria's (Carol Kane) Mafia bookkeeper husband, she tracks the killer to JFK airport and--though not meaning to--aerates the guy. With the mob chasing her and her 4-year-old daughter Angelica (the Baby of the title), Maria dives into the back of Mr. Clean-compulsive Ernie's (Judge Reinhold) cab. When Maria suddenly books, leaving Angelica with Ernie, the latter is left playing wide-eyed straight man to a kid who plays with slime and colors on the cab doors. Exciting stuff? Not hardly. The characters, particularly the bad guys, are all walking tofu: bland and basically featureless. The plot is predictable from first frame to last. And although this movie is purportedly a comedy, some curious shortcuts in human emotion make this an extremely implausible one: the cherub whose daddy has just been plugged seems oblivious to the loss. And her mom's attachment to her departed husband--initially strong enough to make her want to commit murder--apparently fades fast, since by film's end she's swapping spit with a guy who three hours earlier was a total stranger. But the real kicker in this family-oriented comedy is the pointlessly cruel treatment of the elderly. In one extended scene, the head villain walks the halls in a hospital, upturning elderly people in wheelchairs and knocking the crutches out from others. What a sidesplitter. Audience: People who'll watch test-bar patterns on TV if nothing else is on.