Don’t bother seeing ‘The Stepford Wives’

If there were any truth in advertising, this movie would’ve been entitled, “The Suckford Wives.” I haven’t seen a movie so stupid since “Van Helsing.” “The Stepford Wives” is a remake of the 1975 thriller that used science-fiction and horror as a vehicle to address the issues of what was then called “women’s liberation,” and men’s fears and anger about how women’s newfound empowerment would affect their masculinity.

Thirty years later, this retooled telling of the story ditches the horror-story angle in favor of comedy. There are two big problems with this approach: You need a funny script, and actors who know how to deliver funny lines. This movie has neither.

The film stars Nicole Kidman and Matthew Broderick as a New York couple whose marriage is on the rocks. She’s a high-powered TV executive who is fired and has a nervous breakdown. He’s her milquetoast husband who schleps her off to the gated community of Stepford, Conn., which is filled with McMansions and couples who look like throwbacks to the 1950s.

All the women wear pastels and floral prints, bake cupcakes and go giddy over homemade Christmas decorations (“Let’s celebrate the birth of Christ with yarn!”).

Kidman becomes suspicious of these Barbie-doll wives and eventually discovers that all the women in Stepford have been murdered and replaced with subservient robot replicas whose breasts can be inflated via remote control.

But then, the movie takes a twist. Because of poor audience reactions at early test screenings, director Frank Oz was told by the studio to reshoot some scenes and tack-on a happier ending. So, the robot premise is lamely explained away and it turns out the women have had chips implanted in their heads to digitally brainwash them. Or something. I stopped paying attention.Avoid this movie like you would a table dance from Bea Arthur.

GRADE: D-.