The Cartoon Network channel boasts greater plot incidents than Billy Zane's wishy-washy heroics donning a mask for The Phantom. This appalling, featureless comic strip calls to mind the Batman series with Adam West, only without the latter's tongue-in-cheek charm. Zane looks uncomfortable as the purple-clad "good Samaritan." He does very little rescuing and spends the remainder standing still, ready with a daft one-liner.

Who'd want to rescue Kristy Swanson? She plays the sort of spoiled rich girl no man would want for company. Adding to which, she gives a lackluster performance in a film more derivative than the norm. For example, Indiana Jones falls victim to the parody as James Remar dresses in the same outfit (hat and all) which Harrison Ford made famous in the early 1980s. There's no prize for guessing who wears the clothes better.

Sets are unbearably tacky: a skull emblem can be seen at the mouth of the entrance to the Phantom's lair. Yet, who cares about scenery when there's no plot to speak of? Zane does his best working with an undersized script, and director Simon Wincer confuses ambition with sheer gluttony.

O. Nicholas Brown's editing doesn't have an off button. Montages are slammed together like specimens on a petri dish. The idea soon dawns on the viewer that the action scenes will never rise above metronome blandness.

Overall, The Phantom wants to be fun and good natured, however, like the ever-present bully at school, the film never quite achieves the manners necessary to be passable.

(Released by Paramount Home Video and rated "PG" by MPAA.)