One-Liners: Bad Form

BAD MOMS (D+) - Everything is off-key in this vulgar comedy trashing the idea of motherhood.

From the writers-directors of "The Hangover" series, this plays like a Part IV, continuing the epic slide right off the edge. It's another entry into the genre of Women Behaving Badly, and no one has been able to capture the balance achieved by "Bridesmaids," which goes back to 2011.

It's not easy to make Kathryn Hahn unfunny. She is a clever, subtle comedian and actress. Here she is cranked to 11 from the start, spewing profanities as if that's enough to get a laugh. Mila Kunis is the star of this show, and she simply doesn't have the chops to carry a movie, let alone a comedy. She comes off as an average actor giving it a go in wacky skits on the "Sonny & Cher Show."

Christina Applegate does her thing as the nasty super-mom who makes everyone else look bad while scheming to retain control of the local PTA. It's another one-note performance. Kristen Bell is the only bright spot, playing delightfully against type as the uptight mom with a bullying spouse. She exhibits a fine sense of timing. Little Oona Laurence stands out as the wisecracking daughter, bringing some fresh energy to a cliched role.

Otherwise, this absolute mess relies on crotch hits, boob grabs and ridiculous pratfalls. It rarely rises above amusing, inciting more cringes than cackles.

THE BEST DEMOCRACY MONEY CAN BUY (C-minus) - Greg Palast is a hardcore investigative journalist to be admired. But he comes off as a clown in this cartoonish (literally much of the time) examination of the corrupting influences on America's political process.

Palast and newcomer David Ambrose decided, for some reason, to clutter the production with animation and goofball graphic tricks and to present the material in a bizarrely wacky manner. Palast is presented as a gumshoe traveling the world ferreting out the evil deeds of the Koch brothers, Karl Rove and the rest of the right-wingers who are undermining democracy, mostly through their decades-long attacks on the Voting Rights Act, mainly via the purging of voter rolls.

What could have been a sensible one-hour presentation of the subject becomes a nearly two-hour vaudeville show. The animation is in the style of the opening and closing credits of the '60 "Batman" TV show. A bunch of cameos add to the ludicrous nature of the movie. It boasts a "cast" of B-level celebrities: Rosario Dawson, Richard Belzer & Ice-T, Shailene Woodley, Willie Nelson, Ed Asner and Robert Kennedy Jr.

Palast lays the haughty outrage on thick while mugging his way through a serious topic. It ends in maudlin mush with a visit to Martin Luther King's church and a chorus of "We Shall Overcome." If you make it to the end, you'll feel as if you, too, have survived an undignified onslaught.