For those five minutes of film, Great Expectations breathes the same air as Baz Luhrmann's delirious adaptation of Romeo and Juliet. Both films set a well-known story in an era slightly out of time, in a world that is recognizable yet outsized and surreal; but where Luhrmann's R + J kept pushing its source material until it changed (for better and worse) into a pop fever dream, Cuaron's take on Dickens only flies off into the ether occasionally and otherwise remains agonizingly bland. Hawke and Paltrow never generate any heat, and their storybook romance has all the fated glamour of mannequins tossed together on a storeroom floor.

Then again, the actors or the director don't get much help from Mitch Glazer's script, which arbitrarily changes the names and situations in Dickens' novel while failing to put across the book's theme of a love doomed by class envy and a legacy of romantic cruelty. But that doesn't excuse Hawke's "shout-'n'-pout" acting style, or Paltrow's constant look of disinterest, which starts as a character trait and becomes indicative of her commitment to the film as a whole.

The stars do escape Great Expectations with some dignity--unlike poor Robert DeNiro and Anne Bancroft, who overact like crazy in their roles of, respectively, a mysterious criminal and an eccentric old maid. In fact, only three artists can claim any glory from this fairly pointless update--Hank Azaria (who performs with touching sincerity), Francisco Clemente (whose beautiful, aggressive sketches stand-in for Finn's), and the British pop group Pulp (whose "Like a Friend" drives the film's exciting nude modeling scene).

Which leaves Alfonso Cuaron, the director who made magic two years ago with his lovely presentation of the children's novel A Little Princess. One can feel him goosing this new film along from time to time--using exaggerated angles, colors, and camera moves to push Great Expectations to the edge of glorious parody. In scenes like the one at the Chinese restaurant, Cuaron seems to be riffing on Dickensian plots and the silly conventions of romantic films. Unfortunately, none of Cuaron's collaborators seem as enthusiastic about his vision, and these Expectations go unmet.