Serving Sara

Matthew Perry is a gifted comic actor whose style works nicely on TV but somehow hasn't translated into movie success. To change the formula a bit, Serving Sara puts Perry in a slightly scruffier mode, and pairs him with an actress whose sexiness and comic aplomb should be a good counterpart to his wonderfully shticky style: Elizabeth Hurley. And it still doesn't work. This one is set in the exciting world of process-serving, where Perry teams up with jilted wife Hurley to sting her rich husband (reliable goof Bruce Campbell). This screwball plot might have worked if the two stars evinced any chemistry together, and if director Reginald Hudlin knew how to set up a scene. Bright spot: Cedric the Entertainer, as Perry's boss, gets laughs just from doing the tiniest bits of business while seated behind his desk. No small thing in a movie that otherwise labors. --Robert Horton