‘The Proposal’  

It was released for public consumption weeks ago, but power of “The Proposal” rages on. The innocuous romantic-comedy has inexplicably amassed piles of box-office loot — perhaps because of its appealing co-stars, Sandra Bullock and Ryan Reynolds, or a lack of competition (July isn’t exactly a time for Academy Award contenders.)

The storyline, a strained conceit if ever there was one, has a clichéd screenplay to match: Bullock portrays a book company’s editor whose assistant (Reynolds, pigeonholed once again) might as well have the official title “whipping boy.”

 

Our heroine treats him with less respect than a stapler, coercing her colleague into getting married to avoid deportation to Canada. As their ostensible courtship shifts to Alaska — the assistant’s native state — a federal agent gums up the works.

High jinks ensue, with an assist to the tireless Betty White as the would-be groom’s grandmother who supplies witty warmth, until a bizarre sequence where she is found chanting in the woods.

Other veterans who help stop the bleeding, despite merely coasting, include Mary Steenburgen and Craig T. Nelson. The cast’s revelation is Malin Akerman, toning it down several notches from her recent “Watchmen” role.

 

Director Anne Fletcher, who helmed the forgettable “Step Up” and “27 Dresses,” remains in her comfort zone of amusing mediocrity, not unlike the film’s pair of leads. Reynolds long ago became a one-trick pony; evidently, wearing a fat suit in “Just Friends” four years ago was the actor’s idea of expanding his horizons.

Bullock, though superficial out of the gate, eventually fares better while floating between hostile and lovelorn. Realistically her player is a fraud, but emotionally the actress delivers.

Themes of vanity, remorse and love (disguised as lust) emerge to fortify “The Proposal” with credibility and substance, but the pickings remain slim. As they might say in Alaska, you can’t take moose manure and make apple butter.

 

‘Away We Go’  

Unpredictable filmmaker Sam Mendes’ latest offering, though competent and enjoyable enough, proves too crass for its own good.

You might think a mature-minded dramedy would sidestep the landmines of vulgarity and tomfoolery, but “Away We Go” has other ideas.

Every time the movie rights itself with clever, poignant byplay, the dialogue soon splinters.

 

As a thirty-something unwed couple, John Krasinski (unrecognizable from his shtick on television’s “The Office”) and Maya Rudolph expect a baby — mother is at a robust six months — only to learn the beau’s parents are moving overseas. Her folks, conversely, are no help from the grave.

The mates’ solution? Traverse the country in search of an ideal haven for their newborn. Pit stops in Arizona and Wisconsin, where relatives and friends reside, are no cure for what ails our bewildered pair.

Allison Janney, as a belligerent drunk, proves equal to Maggie Gyllenhaal’s patronizing Earth mother, who has an aversion to strollers (“I love my babies; why would I want to push them away from me?”)

 

The outlook appears grim, but our spotlighted duo trudges onward in search of their version of Utopia. For their part, Rudolph and Krasinski shoulder the burden of balancing likability with a sense of snobbishness.

Mendes, whose Oscar-winning “American Beauty” is only his third-best effort — behind “Road to Perdition” and last year’s less-traveled “Revolutionary Road” — here seems torn between obscenity and touching refinement.

Gus Van Sant’s “Good Will Hunting,” for example, was purposefully profane due to its milieu of South Boston, “Away We Go” has no such excuse. Yet we’re stuck with moments when Krasinski and Janney sound like they’re afflicted with Tourette’s syndrome. (Once or twice may be tolerable, but raunchy repetition proves boring at best.)

“Away We Go” lacks the cool wickedness that made “Perdition” and “Revolutionary Road” such compulsive adventures. In this instance, Mendes settles for a curious mix of good, bad and ugly mind games.