"Masters of the Universe" is a live-action version of He-Man, a popular children's cartoon series with lots of fantasy action. Dolph Lundgren plays a bulky but wooden He-Man, and Frank Langella, unrecognizable behind his makeup, plays He-Man's arch nemesis Skeletor. A sincere attempt was made to make an exciting action film, and the filmmakers haven't wholly failed -- but there is a lot of cornball dialogue and unintentional laughs.

We open with shots of a bunch of Darth Vaders and the Emperor, who has a Halloween mask on. Then the goodguys meet up with a Yoda/Ewok cross with lots of hair. They invade the Emperor's fortress; R2D2 unlocks the force field to rescue the princess while everyone else has a blaster fight. They escape by teleporting to a forest moon.

Actually that forest moon turns out to be modern day Earth, where a day in the life of Courtney Cox is about to be turned upside down. It seems Skeletor is after a special type of skeleton key, and this key has crash landed on Earth. Cox's boyfriend finds it and mistakes it for a synthesizer, because obviously all skeleton keys play music and project holograms.

Skeletor is furious, and he sends an entire legion of his best cantina members -- including a Wookiee, a Gremlin, an ugly thing with hair, and who might as well have been Dennis Hopper -- to hunt the goodguys down and exterminate them.

Then there's a LOT of running around on Earth, with badguys tracking people down and goodguys tracking people down and stuff blowing up and so on. Somehow He-Man finds Courtney Cox and helps her out. It's a good thing everyone appears to speak the same language. Among the other meanderings that occur on the planet, Skeletor's minions put a "truth collar" on one kid, to get him to reveal the location of the skeleton key. It's a pretty high tech expensive looking thing, but when they find out what they want to know, they just leave. Apparently the collar was a disposable.

Then the goodguys come crashing in, and the kid fills them in on one just happened as the others take the collar off. "They asked me for the key, but I didn't have it," he explains. "Did they take it?" they ask. "No."

Then there's a landspeeder chase and some more action. Then Skeletor arrives in a big old ship and captures everybody. "Yes you will, yes you will," he threatens. "Or I shall reek unforgettable harm on you." Indeed he does -- he has He-Man beaten with a light.

Eventually, worse comes to worst, and Skeletor attains the Power of the Universe. Apparently the Power of the Universe manifests itself in Skeletor by making his head glow orange. "Tell me about the loneliness of good, He-Man," he says. "Is it equal to the loneliness of evil?" Then an ending that defies explanation ensues. Skeletor is defeated and, as he melts away in slime, threatens, "I'll be back!"

No, you won't.