REVIEWED - HITCH: THE huge success of Hitch at the US box-office - over $140 million in the bank after a month on release - testifies to Will Smith's hefty drawing power. Taking a break from effects-heavy blockbusters, Smith invests Hitch with his easy charm and understated comic flair, which is just as well, given that this light and slight romantic comedy has little else going for it.

Smith plays Alex Hitchens, known as Hitch because it is an abbreviation of his name and because he makes a comfortable living as a Manhattan matchmaker setting up generally gormless men with the women of their dreams.

Hitch's techniques harness all the specialities of the Queer Eye for the Straight Guy quintet into one suave, heterosexual whole, offering tips on dress and dancing, and such revolutionary advice as to look women in the eye during a conversation and to listen to what they are saying.

His latest client, Albert (Kevin James) seems a hopeless case - a clumsy, overweight accountant pining for an attractive, wealthy socialite (Amber Valletta) - but the movie is so strictly formulaic that the outcome won't surprise anyone who has seen a movie or two in the past 70 years.

The same predictability applies to the obstacle-strewn path to true love for Hitch himself, a bachelor nursing a broken heart, and the sassy tabloid gossip columnist (Eva Mendes) who becomes the object of his desire. In fact, the only mild surprise offered in the movie is the blatant product placement for Google.

This simplistic, essentially good-natured yarn would be a lot more tolerable had it not been self-indulgently and pointlessly stretched out for two hours, and ultimately it works best as a travelogue, using Manhattan locations as copiously and as attractively as a Woody Allen movie, but without the wit and observation of even a mid-range Allen comedy. Michael Dwyer