'Fool's Gold': Precious Few Gems in This Briny Ocean

Early in the seagoing, sunken-treasure, romance/adventure/flotsam called "Fool's Gold," someone says, "You married a guy for sex, and then expected him to be smart." Is the speaker referring to the unholy union between Warner Bros. and Matthew McConaughey? No, no, no. The statement is directed at the perky Tess Finnegan (Kate Hudson), who is about to divorce the hunky Ben Finnegan (McConaughey), the irresponsible "treasure salvor" who is so adorable with his shirt off that a rueful Tess will spend the rest of the movie listing in his direction, like the Titanic.

Is it just me, or does the prospect of any movie starring McConaughey (and/or Kate Hudson, for that matter) promise the same kind of experience as having one's head wrapped in medical gauze and marshmallow and being left out on the runway at Dulles during rush hour? Okay, we haven't actually done that, but we have seen any number of McConaughey movies, and as a colleague said Tuesday night as the credits rolled, "It's the kind of movie you don't even have to see to review." If only that were true.

"Fool's Gold" is like a mentally challenged Irish setter -- good-natured but a little dulled by inbreeding. It revolves around a quest for the fabled Queen's Dowry, a boatload of gold and jewels meant to seal a royal marriage deal, that sank in the Caribbean in 1715. ("FG" was actually shot in Australia, and it's beautiful.)

Tess and Ben, who met and married in Florida during spring break (when? 1993?) have spent their entire marriage looking for the booty. Tess is a doctoral candidate in something (history? hair extensions?) and has had her whole life thwarted by Ben's passion for finding the Dowry. So they split up, and immediately get back together when Ben finally finds a substantial clue to what's down there, waiting.

What's up here, not waiting, is a whole boatload of subplots. Ben's underwater wanderings have put him in serious debt to a gangster/rap star named Bigg Bunny (Kevin Hart), who wants the treasure, too. In a stupidly reckless effort to save a windblown hat, Ben endears himself to the flighty, dumb-as-a-doorknob Gemma Honeycutt (Alexis Dziena), whose father, the fabulously wealthy Nigel Honeycutt (Donald Sutherland), takes a shine to both Ben and the idea of finding the Dowry. That Tess is working as a steward aboard Nigel's yacht is the kind of coincidence perhaps only discovered in an M. McConaughey movie; Tess's reaction to discovering Ben aboard the Precious Gem involves the kind of spastic, hysterical overkill that is utterly bewildering, until you remember that it was directed by Andy Tennant ("Hitch," "Sweet Home Alabama"), who also co-wrote the script.

With all due respect to the striking guild members marching around the studio entrances of Burbank and Culver City, Calif., any more than two writers on a movie usually spells trouble. On the other hand, that two of the three scribes responsible for "Fool's Gold" have previously specialized in horror makes perfect sense. On the other hand again, there's only about 10 minutes of plot in "Fool's Gold," most of it delivered during one incongruously talky scene in which Tess and Ben lay out for Nigel the whole history of the ill-fated ship Aurelia, its multiple resting places, its heroic captain and other stuff. Considering that most of "Fool's Gold" consists of musical montages, chase scenes, choreographed spontaneity and gratuitous slapstick, it's as if Tennant and company intended to provide a concession-stand/restroom break in the middle of their otherwise frenetic movie. Feel free to take them up on the offer.

Feel free, also, to be confused by the accents arrayed in "Fool's Gold." Sutherland, always an anchor in a sea of otherwise dubious acting, is trying to sound like James Mason. Ray Winstone, conversely, can't hide his Britishness despite constructing a swamp of American inflection. Ewen Bremner, the rubber-faced Scotsman, plays Ben's Ukrainian sidekick and is funny, though often unintelligible. Malcolm-Jamal Warner, as Bigg Bunny's henchman Cordell, adopts a cartoon Jamaican patois. Dziena, who is actually quite delightful as Gemma, speaks in a purely Hollywood vernacular: American Heiress/Bimbo.

But there isn't all that much to say in "Fool's Gold," which is really about motion, money and making set decoration out of characters we might have actually cared about.

Fool's Gold (113 minutes, at area theaters) is rated PG-13 for action violence, some sexual material, brief nudity and profanity.