Rounding out the weekend’s top five were Kung Fu Panda ($21.7 mil), which I’m quite literally just about to watch with my sons at the Cape Cod Cinema; The Incredible Hulk ($21.6 mil, now just a few mil shy of the original Hulk’s overall take) and The Happening ($10 mil).

credit: tvguide

This contemporary remake of the iconic ’60s TV comedy could have used more of the sly wit of show creators Buck Henry and Mel Brooks and less of the antic humor and overblown action sequences that typify Hollywood’s summer output.

While the film is breezily entertaining, it also is surprisingly generic, despite the likable Steve Carell as Maxwell Smart. Carell does a fine, goofy job. But you wish he could have tapped into his nuanced and darker comic side that is so hilariously revealed in TV’s The Office. Anne Hathaway is about as effective as Agent 99 as can be imagined, short of the original, Barbara Feldon. But the sentimental facets of her character dilute her sardonic and sassy nature.

The hush-hush spy agency CONTROL employs Smart as an analyst, where he impressively deciphers suspicious “chatter” from surveillance tapes.

But he longs to be where the action is as a field agent. After the agency headquarters is attacked and identities of key operatives compromised, the Chief (sharply played by Alan Arkin) promotes Smart to secret agent.

He idolizes the brawny Agent 23 (Dwayne Johnson) but is paired with the sultry Agent 99. He’s instantly attracted; she’s resentful about getting such a nerdy and accident-prone rookie for a partner. The pair is sent on a dangerous mission to thwart a plot for world domination by spy syndicate KAOS.

Smart has only his smarts and trademark gadgets to fight off the malevolent KAOS, headed by Terence Stamp. But his resourcefulness and enthusiasm take him far. As does dumb, bumbling luck.

The screenplay is peppered with such trademark Smart lines as “Sorry about that, Chief,” “Would you believe …?” and “Missed it by that much,” but they seem almost forcibly inserted rather than interwoven naturally into the script.

And a scene featuring Smart peeling gum off his infamous shoe phone on board a plane is almost a replica of a gag in the latest Harold & Kumar movie.

On the plus side, the high-tech “Cone of Silence” sequence offers fresh laughs, as does Smart’s arsenal of gadgets, including exploding dental floss and a flame-throwing Swiss Army knife.

This is a film that is keenly aware of its impending summer blockbuster status. And with that in mind, it can’t decide whether it wants to be a thrilling action movie or a quirky comic spoof. The elements seem in conflict, rather than seamlessly blended. (Rated PG-13 for some rude humor, action violence and language. Running time: 1 hour, 50 minutes. Opens tonight in some theaters and Friday nationwide.)

By Roger Ebert

The closing credits of “Get Smart” mention Mel Brooks and Buck Henry, creators of the original TV series, as “consultants.” Their advice must have been: “If it works, don’t fix it.” There have been countless comic spoofs of the genre founded by James Bond, but “Get Smart” (both on TV and now in a movie) is one of the best. It’s funny, exciting, preposterous, great to look at, and made with the same level of technical expertise we’d expect from a new Bond movie itself. And all of that is very nice, but nicer still is the perfect pitch of the casting.

Steve Carell makes an infectious Maxwell Smart, the bumbling but ambitious and unreasonably self-confident agent for CONTROL, a secret U.S. agency in rivalry with the CIA. His job is to decipher overheard conversations involving agents of KAOS, its Russian counterpart. At this he is excellent: What does it mean that KAOS agents discuss muffins? That they have a high level of anxiety, of course, because muffins are a comfort food. Brilliant, but he misses the significance of the bakery they’re also discussing - a cookery for high-level uranium.

Smart is amazingly promoted to a field agent by the Chief (Alan Arkin, calm and cool) and teamed with the beautiful Agent 99 (Anne Hathaway, who never tries too hard but dominates the screen effortlessly). They go to Russia, joining with Agent 23 (Dwayne Johnson, once known as The Rock). Their archenemy is waiting for them; he’s Siegfried (Terence Stamp), a cool, clipped villain.

And that’s about it, except for a series of special-effects sequences and stunt work that would truly give envy to a James Bond producer. “Get Smart” is an A-level production, not a cheapo ripoff, and some of the chase sequences are among the most elaborate you can imagine - particularly a climactic number involving planes, trains and automobiles. Maxwell Smart of course proves indestructible, often because of the intervention of Agent 99; he spends much of the center portion of the film in free-fall without a parachute, and then later is towed behind an airplane.

The plot involves a KAOS scheme to nuke the Walt Disney concert hall in Los Angeles during a concert being attended by the U.S. president. The nuclear device in question is concealed beneath the concert grand on the stage, which raises the question: Since you’re using the Bomb, does its location make much difference, give or take a few miles?

It raises another question, too, and here I will be the gloom-monger at the festivities. Remember right after 9/11, when we wondered if Hollywood would ever again be able to depict terrorist attacks as entertainment? How long ago that must have been, since now we are blowing up presidents and cities as a plot device for Maxwell Smart. I’m not objecting, just observing. Maybe humor has a way of helping us face our demons.

The props in the movie are neat, especially a Swiss Army-style knife that Maxwell never quite masters. The locations, many in Montreal, are awesome; I learned with amazement that Moscow was not one of them, but must have been created on a computer. The action-and-chase sequences do not grow tedious because they are punctuated with humor. I am not given to quoting filmmakers in praise of their own work in press releases, but director Peter Segal does an excellent job of describing his method: “If we plan a fight sequence as a rhythmic series of punches, we would have a ‘bump, bump, bam’ or a ‘bump, bump, smack.’ We can slot in a punchline instead of a physical hit. The rhythm accentuates the joke and it becomes ‘bump, bump, joke’ with the verbal jab as the knockout or a joke immediately followed by the last physical beat that essentially ends the conversation.”

Yes. And the jokes actually have something to do with a developing story line involving Anne Hathaway’s love life, the reason for her plastic surgery, and a love triangle that is right there staring us in the face. One of the gifts of Steve Carell is to deliver punchlines in the middle of punches and allow both to seem real enough at least within the context of the movie. James Bond could do that, too. And in a summer with no new Bond picture, will I be considered a heretic by saying “Get Smart” will do just about as well?

3.5 stars

“Get Smart,” a remake of the ’60s television series of the same name, earned an estimated $13.35 million on Friday, said distributor Warner Bros. Pictures.

The Time Warner-owned studio said the film would end up with about $37 million — slightly ahead of forecasts — once ticket sales for Saturday and Sunday are factored in. Estimates for the three-day period will be issued on Sunday, followed by final data on Monday.

“The Love Guru,” meanwhile, opened at No. 4 with just $5.4 million, according to tracking firm Box Office Mojo, and will fall far short of the $20 million range that Hollywood pundits had picked for the weekend. Paramount Pictures, the film’s Viacom Inc-owned distributor, declined to comment.

The studios’ decision to stake out the same weekend for their competing comedies surprised many observers, who predicted they would end up cannibalizing each other. Critics were largely appalled by both films.

“Get Smart” stars Steve Carell as Maxwell Smart, the bumbling secret agent originated by Don Adams. Anne Hathaway fills in for Barbara Feldon as his smart sidekick, Agent 99.

Warner Bros. partnered on the $80 million project with Australia’s Village Roadshow Ltd. It looks to have a happier journey than the companies’ recent disaster “Speed Racer.”

“The Love Guru,” which marks Myers’ first on-screen appearance since the 2003 bomb “The Cat in the Hat,” reportedly cost about $60 million to make. The Canadian actor plays a Deepak Chopra-style New Age guru.

Last weekend’s champion, the Marvel Entertainment Inc-produced superhero saga “The Incredible Hulk,” slipped to No. 2 with about $6.4 million, taking its 8-day total to $81 million, said Box Office Mojo. “Hulk” was distributed by General Electric Co’s Universal Pictures,

The DreamWorks Animation SKG Inc cartoon “Kung Fu Panda” was down one to No. 3 with about $6.3 million in its third round. It has earned $140 million to date, said Box Office Mojo. “Kung Fu Panda” is distributed by Paramount.

Here’s a news flash: The Rock is no more. It’s not even Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson but merely Dwayne Johnson, plain vanilla, regular guy, would-be action-hero for the text-message set.

For us mere mortals, it’s always slightly mystifying to watch celebrities and their names mutate. Madonna Ciccone to Madonna. Fabio Lanzoni to Fabio. Prince Rogers Nelson to Prince to The Artist formerly known as Prince to the unruly acronym TAFKAP.

And let’s not forget Sean Combs, who seems to shuffle his handle with each new business incarnation. Just last week, he posted a bizarre video on You Tube, explaining that despite rumors to the contrary, he hadn’t changed his name . . . again. Staring at the camera, he ranted, “But if I wanted to I could call myself anything I want because I have lived this life . . . By the way, I’m rich. . . . I would say that to any of my names.”

A few years back, I was asked by a women’s magazine to interview Jennifer Lopez (in her early J-Lo days) while she was getting a manicure. We were supposed to get them together in a totally faux-women’s-bonding moment, but she came with a very large posse, and there weren’t enough manicurists to go around. So they got their fingers buffed while I stood and watched. Anyway, it was around the time she was dating Combs, a.k.a. Puff Daddy, Puffy, P. Diddy, Diddy, Sean . . . I had no idea how to refer to him so settled for “your boyfriend.” (I don’t think Lopez noticed much — she was busy ripping pages from a fashion magazine and handing them to an assistant/publicist/hanger-on and asking her to find the pictured item.)

OPTING for a solo one-word stage name is like grabbing for the brass ring in celebrity-dom. It’s a naked bid for icon status, a way to brand yourself like Kleenex or Xerox or Liberace. Going the other direction, however, is rare. It connotes artistic seriousness and the versatility needed for true art. Dana Owens to Queen Latifah and back to Dana Owens (but only when she’s singing jazz). Marky Mark to Mark Wahlberg. John Cougar to John Cougar Mellencamp to just John Mellencamp.

I asked Johnson about his moniker change recently, which is being touted in “Get Smart,” where Johnson plays suave Agent 23, the ultimate in spies — or in Johnson’s rendition, a suavely amusing send-up of the über agent. I guess it’s hard to take an actor seriously who bills himself as The Rock (The Rock stars in Hamlet!), and the former wrestler is clearly intent on transforming himself, if not into John Gielgud exactly, at least into a family-friendly movie star.

He recently jetted back from Las Vegas, where he’d been shooting the Disney remake of “Race to Witch Mountain,” in which he plays a Vegas cabby charged with helping a pair of kids with paranormal powers escape to the Luxor, where they make gobs of money in 30 seconds flat. Just kidding. They actually are fleeing the usual array of government and alien evil-doers.

Johnson was perennially genial, though I suspect he keeps a Power Point presentation of his career plans in his head. “The Rock was a name, a character I created in TV. When I made the transition into film, I knew eventually I was going to be billed as my given name,” he said via telephone. Real actors have real names, not just brand monikers. “I wanted the transition to happen naturally. Ten years ago [when he went into films and television], I didn’t want to make an announcement or a statement, ‘From this day forward, I’m an actor.’ I didn’t want to make a big deal about it. There was just a natural and easy way for the transition to happen.”

Flash back 10 years, and Johnson was strutting around in black wrestling shorts, taunting opponents with his signature eyebrow move and boisterous trash talk. The seven-time WWE champion liked to refer to himself in the third person, as in “The Rock says,” and add un-Disney-like comments such as “Keep bangin’ on that door and The Rock’s gonna lay the smack down on your candy ass.”

Even then, “The Rock” wasn’t his first incarnation. The 36-year-old, part African Canadian and part Samoan, had done a stint as a college football player for the Miami Hurricanes and had been a short-lived pro player for the Calgary Stampeders. He first tried wrestling under his given name, then with a stage name of Flex Kavana. He later morphed into a baby-faced good-guy wrestler called Rocky Maivia.

“My father and grandfather were professional wrestlers,” Johnson said. “Rocky’s my dad’s first name, and Maivia was my grandfather’s last name. The company thought it was a good idea to merge the two names together out of respect for my father and grandfather,” and all the marketing possibilities.

IN 1998, Johnson dumped their names for The Rock, because, as he says, “I just wanted to make it on my own.” He also tweaked his persona, changing into a mouthy bully as part of the “Nation of Domination.” When the fans stopped ritualistically booing him, Johnson overhauled his act again. “My intent and goal was to inject humor in as many places as I could within the structure of the show. Humor was not a big part of that world. For me, the goal was never to be the biggest, loudest and toughest guy. The goal was to be the most entertaining.”

He did anything he could think of to entertain his weekly audience of 20,000 to 30,000 live wrestling fans — sing, operate the camera himself. “It got to a point where there was nothing I was not willing to try in front of a live audience. Sometimes I stank, and sometimes it was grand slams, and those balls still haven’t come down.”

Given his physique, Hollywood initially tried to send Johnson the action route, with such fare as “The Scorpion King” and “The Rundown.” But times have changed since the ’80s and ’90s when he-men like Sylvester Stallone, Steven Seagal and Arnold Schwarzenegger strode the cinema colossus. Action heroes these days are sleek like Christian Bale or Will Smith or boyish like Tobey Maguire or smart like Robert Downey Jr.

One only has to look at the mess in Iraq to know that power — and hugely defined muscles — can’t solve everything. Pure might has a hard time battling ingenuity and fanatical suicide bombers. In fact, it’s hard to even look at muscles seriously these days, given the steroid scandals rocking professional sports. Today’s action heroes tend to be comic-book heroes where the aesthetic tends to be boyish — just like the fan base.

These days, killer pecs are an ironic accouterment best suited for comedies like “Get Smart” or family films because kids, unlike adults, still see giant men as powerful. Johnson’s career exploded with last year’s Disney flick “The Game Plan,” a Mr. Mom-style comedy with Johnson as a vain professional football player doomed to care for a little girl. And Johnson, who has a 6-year-old daughter, seems perfectly content to be a Disney-style guy. No knocking the Mouse’s brand appeal and marketing might.

After “Witch Mountain,” he’s donning wings to play the tooth fairy — yes, the one that puts money under your pillow in exchange for molars and bicuspids in “Tooth Fairy.” “With high-concept comedies like that, it’s always about the collisions of worlds,” Johnson says. In this case, it’s a powerhouse of masculinity “being forced begrudgingly to become the tooth fairy.”

JOHNSON talks about structuring his career like Tom Hanks or Will Smith, Everymen who appeal to all quadrants, but in truth, he most closely resembles Schwarzenegger, when he segued from “The Terminator” into “Twins” and “Kindergarten Cop.” Indeed, Schwarzenegger himself once toyed with playing a version of the tooth fairy before bailing out for another arena ripe for self-re-creation, politics.

So I asked Johnson what he wanted people to call him, if they ever ran into the star while he’s working out or having a cappuccino. Johnson isn’t fussy like Edward Norton, who mandates that he is never, ever called Ed.

“They call me both,” says Johnson. “Rock is a nickname, and it will always be. I’m fine with that. It sounds better than Cupcake.”

credit: losangelestimes