Men in Black 3

Directed by Barry Sonnenfeld

(PG-13)

***

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Once Tommy Lee Jones steps aside, Will Smith’s latest big-budget hit is “about as good as one could hope for from an unnecessary sequel,” said Ty Burr in The Boston Globe. Reviving a 15-year-old action-comedy franchise about mismatched secret agents battling aliens in our midst, Smith and Jones only briefly reunite before the “cumbersome” premise sends Smith back to 1969 and unleashes much “deft, absurdist entertainment.” Smith, back from a self-imposed screen hiatus, proves “a reliable pro,” adding nuance to some creaky dialogue and standing back for the two performances that make MIB 3 “actually worth something.” As an alien who can glimpse multiple possible futures at once, “the wonderful Michael Stuhlbarg” wears a perpetually worried smile, said Lisa Schwarzbaum in Entertainment Weekly. As the stand-in for a younger Jones, Josh Brolin creates a riff on the dyspeptic actor that’s “one for the thespian yearbook.” This comedy “manages, in the end, to be touching as well as whimsical,” said A.O. Scott in The New York Times. Maybe it’s because it’s unnecessary that it turns out to be so much fun.