Bad bet: (L-R) Will Ferrell, Radha Mitchell and Steve Carrell star in Woody Allen's latest disappointment,

Close your eyes while watching the latest Woody Allen feature, Melinda and Melinda, and it becomes twice as good. That's because the dialogue is as rich and smart as an Allen script should be. But to recommend watching any movie with eyes shut in order to black out the connect-the-dots photography, forgettable performances and missed sight gags shows just how lackluster Melinda and Melinda turns out to be. Allen doesn't make many awful movies, but this one is lukewarm at best, with little worth recommending beyond nostalgia over the Allen canon and appreciation for the rare character comedy made for adult audiences.

Allen's 34th film as a director begins with friendly chatter among friends at a Manhattan restaurant. A young man asks his companions: "Let me tell you a story and you tell me whether it's material for a comedy or a tragedy."

A pretty young woman, Melinda (Radha Mitchell), interrupts a Manhattan dinner party. Two dueling playwrights lead the game. One sees the story as tragic, involving Melinda with a childhood friend (Chloe Sevigny) and her actor husband (Jonny Lee Miller) hoping to win a plumb stage role. The other playwright sees Melinda's story as comical and pairs her with an aspiring director (Amanda Peet) hoping to win financial backing for her sophomore film and her out-of-work actor husband (Will Ferrell).

Melinda and Melinda features two separate stories, although both tend to blur together. It's not the first Allen movie to meld his aspirations for Anton Chekov-like drama with slapstick gags -- 1990's Crimes and Misdemeanors is 10 times the movie that is Melinda and Melinda. Still, Allen keeps the ping-pong match between the dueling plots coherent.

Mitchell is the double heroine of the film, and for every moment that she achieves the right touch of loopy behavior -- she's at her best when trying on clothes -- there are many moments when she falls flat. Melinda is an emotional mess in both stories, but Mitchell lacks the charisma to make it matter.

Granted, Mitchell is pretty with her curly blonde hair and full-moon face, but she doesn't have the spunk to be a standout Woody Allen heroine -- even delicate Mia Farrow showed sass when called upon, and Diane Keaton and Judy Davis were all about attitude.

Ferrell is the Allen surrogate in Melinda and Melinda, but he fails by comparison. He stumbles with Allen's anxious banter and is clumsy with his character's nebbish trademarks and nervous tics.

Ferrell, so well suited for childish pranks and lowbrow slapstick in comedies like Elf and Old School, fails to smarten up in Melinda and Melinda. Every time he appears onscreen, the thought that Allen should have cast Owen Wilson, someone who has a knack for adult whimsy thanks to his work in Wes Anderson movies, takes over.

Sevigny and Brooke Smith blend perfectly with their Manhattan surroundings as Melinda's longtime friends. In tale two, Peet shows plenty of comic pizzazz as the workaholic filmmaker with little patience for Ferrell's deadbeat actor. Any one of them would have boosted the film had they played Melinda.

Melinda and Melinda's stories unfold in Allen's beloved New York City, but cinematographer Vilmos Zsigmond never finds the Manhattan sparkle that made previous Allen films so beautiful.

Allen has been directing, writing and starring in most of his films since 1965, when he wrote and appeared as a supporting player in What's New Pussycat? He's an undisputed film auteur who stands above other film artists because he has made comedy his genre of choice. But while he's matured from the slapstick farces Bananas and Sleeper to richer stories like Annie Hall and Husbands and Wives, he has stumbled recently.

There is charm and intelligence in Melinda and Melinda but none of the belly laughs or insightful drama of his past films. It's about romantic happenstance, loves yearned for, lost and, perhaps, if one is lucky, regained by chance.

The same hope is true for Allen -- that with luck he will create one more masterpiece, a film to love, instead of one to accept with feelings of what might have been.

When she appeared in Allen's lone musical -- the sweet and lovely romantic comedy Everyone Says I Love You -- Drew Barrymore chose to have another voice dubbed in for her musical numbers (the rest of the cast sang theirs). Barrymore lacked confidence in her ability to carry a tune but she and Allen recognized her knack for making people laugh and feeling good inside.

Barrymore is a natural comedienne and the loving heart beating within Peter and Bobby Farrelly's uplifting baseball romance, Fever Pitch. Based on Nick Hornby's best-selling novel about London soccer (the book was also adapted into a British comedy starring Colin Firth), the Farrelly brothers and writers Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandel flip the story to Boston and to Major League Baseball, specifically Red Sox nation.

Fever Pitch charts the romance of modest math teacher Ben Wrightman (Jimmy Fallon) and successful business consultant Lindsey Meeks (Barrymore), who decide not to let the gap in their incomes prevent a chance at personal happiness. But Ben has loved the Red Sox since he was 7 and now, 23 years later, he's still fanatical about them. Lindsey thinks she can handle it. After all, she's a workaholic. But even she is unprepared for the level of his mania.

Fallon is appropriately silly and shaggy as a sports fanatic incapable of putting anyone or anything above his beloved Sox. Only he could sing along to Neil Diamond's "Sweet Caroline" and make it seem lovable.

The Farrelly brothers balance Fever Pitch with numerous slapstick gags, but its romance is true and heartfelt. Ben turns serious when he explains to Lindsey about the curse of the Bambino -- when a Red Sox owner sold Babe Ruth to the Yankees in 1918.

Fever Pitch is about 86 years of longing for a winning team and heartsickness over finding someone to share your life, quirks and all. The climax at a post-season Red Sox game -- filmed during the 2004 World Series -- is more romantic than funny, and yet it's still satisfying.

Something About Mary remains the Farrelly brothers' standout comedy, but it's impressive to watch them shift from riotous gross-out to a story that's touching and romantic.

They've matured with Fever Pitch -- just like Woody Allen matured with Annie Hall 28 years ago. If, and this is a big if, the brothers keep trying new ideas, their best work might still lie ahead.

Melinda and Melinda grade: D

Fever Pitch grade: B