Are We Done Yet? is ostensibly a sequel to 2004's Are We There Yet? But in fact it's a remake of the 1948 comedy Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House, which starred Cary Grant and Myrna Loy. In this one, Ice Cube plays the Grant role, and critics warn that he's far from an improvement. "That a glowering sourpuss like Ice Cube should take a part once performed by the most engaging and mischievous of comedic players (Grant) is in itself depressing," writes Stephen Cole in the Toronto Globe & Mail. Moreover, Michael Phillips observes in the Chicago Tribune that Blandings had "a machine-tooled efficiency, and it didn't strain to please. Are We Done Yet? strains." But Bob Strauss of the Los Angeles Daily News suggests that the movie didn't strain hard enough: "There is only one fart joke and just a single butt-crack shot, so I guess you could say that the movie has a certain degree of class. But that just makes this kind of thing duller, too."

Firehouse Dog apparently does not exhibit the same sort of restrained taste as Are We Done Yet? Roger Moore in the Orlando Sentinel remarks that he "could've lived without the shot of the dog doing his 'business' in a pot of stew. And breaking wind multiple times." But defending the movie, Bruce Westbrook writes in the Houston Chronicle that although some "potty humor" occurs, "it's not overdone. Just because times have changed since Rin Tin Tin doesn't mean they've gone to the dogs." Still, many reviews include warnings: "You'd be better off taking your kid to visit a dog run for a couple of hours," writes Kyle Smith in the New York Post. "A kid would have to be pretty desperate to leave the house -- and waste allowance money -- for this modest distraction," writes Elizabeth Weitzman in the New York Daily News. On the other hand, Alex Chun writes in the Los Angeles Times, "Though it never completely catches fire, there's enough earnestness and warmth that makes it a welcome alternative in a family film arena dominated by computer animation and associated toy lines." And Carrie Rickey concludes in the Philadelphia Inquirer that the movie is "touching, family-friendly," that is "barking up the right tree."

Some critics, it seems, don't know what to make of Basic Instinct director Paul Verhoeven's latest film, the World War II drama Black Book. Manohla Dargis in the New York Times describes it as "supremely vulgar" and notes that it "works only if you take it for the pulpiest of fiction." That's precisely the way Glenn Whipp perceives it, as he writes in the Los Angeles Daily News that it's an "exhilarating potboiler that is thrilling, erotic and constant in its desire to upend viewers' expectations." Kenneth Turan in the Los Angeles Times remarks that the film is full of "dizzying contradictions." It is, he says, "as subversive as it is traditional, both enamored of conventional notions of heroism and frankly contemptuous of them." And while John Anderson of Newsday describes it as "a strange movie," he comments that its release "marks a red-letter day ... for fans of sophisticated, high-tension melodramas, war movies and sexy adult thrillers."

Entertainment mogul David Geffen has not given up hope of buying the Los Angeles Times. Although some financial analysts have suggested that capital gains taxes on a sale of the Times would rule out a deal with Geffen, the Times itself, in an article about Geffen's current efforts, quoted Lehman Bros. tax expert Robert Willens as saying that a sale could be structured as a "sponsored spinoff," which the Times described as "an increasingly popular method for corporations to divest subsidiaries without incurring large tax bills."

With Spring Break upon us, the studios are opening three movies today (Wednesday) in advance of the Easter holiday weekend. The three, Are We Done Yet?, Firehouse Dog, and Black Book, are not expected to offer a significant challenge to last weekend's winners, Blades of Glory and Meet the Robinsons.

It may only have placed two regular shows in the top ten last week -- plus the NCAA basketball semifinals -- but CBS nevertheless commanded the highest overall ratings of any network, averaging a 7.3 rating and a 12 share. Fox, which has just about everything riding on American Idol, placed second with a 6.3/11. ABC, whose numbers were bolstered by Dancing With the Stars, placed third with a 5.7/10, while NBC trailed with a 4.9/8.

The top ten shows of the week according to Nielsen Research: 1. American Idol (Tuesday), Fox, 16.2/26; 1. (Tie) American Idol (Wednesday), Fox, 16.2/25; 3. CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, CBS, 14.0/22; 4. Dancing With the Stars, ABC, 13.0/20; 5. House, Fox, 12.1/19; 6. Dancing With the Stars Result (Tuesday), ABC, 11.6/18; 7. Shark, CBS, 9.6/17; 8. Law and Order: SVU, NBC, 9.0/16; 8. Til Death, Fox, 9.0/14; 10. NCAA Basketball Championships, CBS, 8.9/17; 10. (Tie) CSI: Miami, CBS, 8.9/15.

Although producers of the Broadway revival of Grease had boasted that advance ticket sales have totaled more than $9 million, largely due to the recently concluded reality contest Grease: You're the One that I Want, they may have spoken too soon. According to New York Post theater columnist Michael Riedel, the Ticketmaster switchboard in New York was flooded with phone calls following the final segment Sunday night with calls from ticket buyers wanting their money back. According to Riedel, callers were unhappy with the actors chosen to star in the revival, Max Crumm and Laura Osnes. "There was a bit of a frenzy because a lot of people wanted Austin and Ashley to win," a source told Riedel, referring to the runners-up, Austin Miller and Ashley Spencer. A spokesman for the TV show denied that there was a "substantial number of calls" for refunds.

He may be seen by millions on Law & Order, but few people have any idea who Fred Thompson is, according to a new Gallup poll. While he ranks third out of a huge field of potential Republican presidential candidates, behind Sen. John McCain and Rudy Giuliani, just 4 percent of those who were polled were able to identify him with the TV show (although 11 percent did identify him as an actor). Gallup Poll director Frank Newport noted that when asked, "What comes to your mind when you think about" Thompson?, two-thirds replied "nothing at all comes to mind. ... In other words, despite his acting career, Thompson is not among the ranks of well-known politicians at this point." News reports have indicated that under the FCC's equal-time rule, all Law & Order episodes featuring Thompson, including those in syndication, would have to be yanked if he decides to run.

Out magazine, which claims to have the largest circulation of any gay-oriented publication, has placed CNN anchor Anderson Cooper and actress Jodie Foster on the cover of its current issue, which includes the magazine's first Gay Power List. (The cover features two models holding paper cut-outs of Foster's and Cooper's faces over their own.) Neither has openly acknowledged that they are gay, although for some time they have been the subject of tabloid rumors about their sexual orientation. The online edition of Radar magazine quoted Out editor in chief Aaron Hicklin as saying, "It's a bit of chutzpah on our part. ... The A-list and even B-list gays are mostly in the closet still, and those are the kinds of people we need to have on our cover. This is a way of addressing that." Neither Cooper nor Foster was available for comment.

John Roberts, who quit CBS last year after he was passed over for the anchor's post when the network hired Katie Couric to succeed Dan Rather, has been named co-anchor of CNN's American Morning. Roberts, along with for Fox weekend anchor Kiran Chetry, will replace Soledad O'Brien and Miles O'Brien. Meanwhile, CBS announced that it has signed CNN's Lou Dobbs as a regular contributor to its The Early Show on Tuesdays.

Competition between the two leading nightly newscasts was the tightest it has been in recent memory during the first quarter, with NBC Nightly News With Brian Williams drawing an average of 9,297,000 viewers while ABC World News With Charles Gibson recorded 9,181,000. The CBS Evening News With Katie Couric dropped to 7,325,000. NBC's overall audience for its newscast was down 6 pecent; CBS's was down 8 percent, while ABC's rose 4 percent.

Joshua Wolf, the freelance videographer who spent 226 days in a California prison for refusing to turn over tapes of a San Francisco demonstration in 2005 to a federal grand jury was freed from a U.S. prison in Dublin, CA Tuesday after reaching a deal with prosecutors. Under it, Wolf agreed to post all of his videotape of the demonstration on his website; in return, prosecutors agreed not to force him to provide the tapes directly to the grand jury. In a statement sent by email to reporters, Wolf said, "It took 226 days, but it was worth every second to get what I wanted from day one, which is that I will not have to testify before the grand jury. ... There will be, and has been, no compromise to this resolute principle."