The Truth About Charlie (2002) – 3.9

Dreadful.  Jonathan Demme’s take on the vaguely amusing Audrey Hepburn-Cary Grant Charade (1963) is equally unnecessary as its predecessor, but lacks any hint of the original’s charm or cheekiness.  The meager plotline may have served the 1960s well enough, but wartime looting and precious stamps just don’t hold up for modern-day audiences.  Thandie Newton (looking wet-kittenish) and Mark Wahlberg (characteristically bulldog-faced and clueless) lead the film’s painfully international cast that includes Tim Robbins, Lisa Gay Hamilton (the black chick from The Practice), and Joong-Hoon Park, who can’t speak a lick of decipherable English.  Charles Aznavour, Anna Karina, and Agnès Varda make unfortunate cameos, and Paris has never looked duller.