PREMIERE.COM'S REVIEW (posted 3/04/05)

In the words of Ogden Nash, "Behold the duck. It does not cluck. A cluck it lacks.  It quacks." This, folks, is what it takes to upstage The Pacifier star Vin Diesel these days: a duck. In Disney's cookie-cutter Navy-S.E.A.L.-as-babysitter comedy, it is the family duck who supplies the movie's first laugh, biting Diesel's ear when he shows up at the Plummer residence to accept his assignment — protecting five rascally kids from whoever's trying to steal their dad's top-secret research. And it's the duck who eventually saves the day, stepping in where Diesel's kung-fu training leaves off. Between these two high points, Diesel valiantly but unsuccessfully tries to raise this inane bit of Mr. Mommery above its afternoon-special standing (even the score sounds recycled, like "A Spoonful of Sugar" orchestrated as a military march).

The movie's basic premise is this: Take Hollywood's most masculine actor and air-drop him into a sitcom scenario where he doesn't fit. With Kindergarten Cop star Arnold Schwarzenegger busy tackling California's "gurly-man" politics and Hulk Hogan turned total has-been since Mr. Nanny, that leaves Diesel as the top contender. The gravel-voiced, top-heavy action hero has no trouble barking orders at the kids until they agree to do things his way ("no highway option"), but as the movie progresses and the kids slowly melt his icy exterior, it becomes clear that the real Vin Diesel is just one big softie.

Consider Diesel's natural hamminess when forced to do the "Peter Panda Dance" or the enthusiasm with which he takes over directing a school play. Here's an actor who's been looking for an excuse to make a live-action kid's movie (he supplied the lead voice for one of the best animated family films a few years back in The Iron Giant), not someone who legitimately dislikes his costars — unlike, say, Tommy Lee Jones, who seems to be playing his own unpleasant self in Man of the House. As a result, you don't necessarily buy the tough-guy laughs (with the exception of Diesel's "They're not boobs" line, which is sure to follow in the "It's not a tumor" tradition to become The Pacifier's trademark quotation). Still, kids'll wish they had a babysitter like this around — an action figure who straps milk bottles and juice boxes to his utility belt, making suburban life feel like a constant Nickelodeon adventure — while parents will find themselves wishing their kids hadn't been exposed to so many bad examples.

—Peter Debruge