The poster for the movie Guess Who displays an overbearing Bernie Mac squashing Ashton Kutcher into a Slim Jim in one tiny spot of a large yellow sofa. Yeah, it didn't make me want to see the film either, but it did give me an idea of where I was going when I went into the theater.

It turns out that the poster image was right on. Guess Who is a comedy about an domineering and protective black father (Mac) who has been fortunate enough to have a lovely daughter (Zoe Saldana) who just so happens to be bringing home a white boyfriend (Kutcher) to meet the parents. Oh yeah, the two are also engaged.

In this day in age, we like to think that we're all colorblind and that we accept everyone simply for their character. Guess Who is banking on the idea that many of us don't think that way -- which, sadly, is a true statement -- because if we did, this movie would have very little meaning or point. Loosely based on the 1967 film Guess Who's Coming To Dinner, about an upper-class white woman who brings home a black man to introduce to mom and dad, Guess Who is a comedy that centers around a racial premise.

This time -- showing just how far our society has advanced in thirty years since the original -- the upper class woman and her family are black, while the significant other is white.

If this comedy wanted to communicate more to an audience than just a tale of two races colliding comically, it has already messed up big time in the casting. Kutcher is a good physical comedian. Sadly, that's all that he is. He's not a good actor, and he really doesn't come off as being comfortable playing it straight. If he wanted to see a decent example of how to balance his act, he should have looked no further than his partner-in-crime Mac, who I believe was a good fit for his role. There are scenes where Mac stretches his abilities in both comedic and dramatic ways, primarily because he understands his character and he reacts the way we think he would react.

Kutcher, on the other hand, appears lost in any scene where he's not trying on his girlfriend's lingerie. Witness a dinner table scene that grows more uncomfortable by the minute when Simon, Kutcher's character, begins reciting racial jokes. This could have been the funniest scene in the movie if the actor had just realized where he wanted to go with it. As it turns out, Kutcher appears to be restraining the physical comedy that he loves so much in favor of being a more believable and well-mannered boyfriend. This is a mistake, and a common one that Kutcher makes in this movie.

Back to the premise at hand in the film -- the subject of racial tension. If there is no way to get around the casting, which, at this point, there isn't, we must look at the scenes and dialogue that the movie provides us with. Sadly, there is very little substance to these parts of the film as well. Instead of diving right into the core of what it pretends to be about, Guess Who jumps around the race issue like someone who has just taken a class in political correctness. I kept waiting for the plot's tension dodging to stop and for the two sides (Mac and Kutcher) to justify their attitudes toward one another, but this never happened. Instead, what I got was essentially an array of throwaway racial gags and stereotypical statements that can be found in nearly any Chris Rock film.

Basically what this means is that when you strip Guess Who down to its bare bones, all you get is a bad comedic film. As I stated above, the filmmakers were banking on a premise to get them through an otherwise lame script. Well, that premise failed, and so does this unnecessary and unintelligent film.