Permanent houseguest Dupree (Owen Wilson), left, Molly (Kate Hudson) and her husband Carl (Matt Dillon) kick back and relax in this scene from the Universal Pictures' comedy "You, Me and Dupree."

"You, Me and Dupree" features three first-rate actors in need of a first-rate movie.

By now, moviegoers know that Matt Dillon can play goofy yet somehow sinister and that Kate Hudson can play pert and perky without being irritating. And Owen Wilson, of course, is the clown prince of slackers.

The three deliver solid comic performances, but the film lacks the necessary spontaneity. Most of its antics seem calculated, and its storyline grows increasingly predictable.

This time out, Wilson enjoys the elevated status of best man rather than wedding crasher. His Dupree and Dillon's Carl have been best buds since boyhood, and Dupree seems delighted by his friend's marriage to Hudson's Molly.

But taking a week off for the nuptials costs Dupree his job, and he's now penniless. Somewhat to Molly's dismay, Carl offers him their home until he finds a new job. And Dupree is in no hurry to find employment.

Meanwhile, Carl has his own vocational problems. He's underling to Molly's egomaniacal real-estate-mogul father, Thompson (played with silken smoothness by Michael Douglas in a comic variation of "Wall Street's" Gordon Gekko). A possessive poppa, Thompson takes delight in humiliating his daughter's groom.

Dupree's tenure as houseguest adds to the newlyweds' problems. There's the inevitable rebellious toilet as well as a skateboard disaster and, most inevitable of all, moments of interrupted intimacy.

Predictably, Dupree's carefree nature wins Molly's heart. Just as predictably, Carl grows evermore paranoid about job and marriage. He never fully believes Dupree's protestations of innocence, and neither does the audience.

Despite Douglas' suave deviltry, the film's chief villains are screenwriter Michael Le Sieur and co-directing siblings Anthony and Joe Russo. There must be a way to make a movie about a tiresome situation without becoming tiresome, but Le Sieur and the Russo fraters have not discovered it.Particularly painful are the heart-to-heart talks that cloud the movie's final episodes. Like last summer's "Wedding Crashers," the new movie is at its best when at its nastiest. But "Wedding Crashers" achieved a balance between cynicism and romance, which "You, Me and Dupree" never does.The cast at least elevates the frenzied shenanigans. Wilson is one of the film's producers and has the close-ups to prove it. Ultimately, his unforced affability triumphs over a by-now stereotyped slacker character. When he delivers a motivational speech at schoolteacher Molly's classroom, he does so with genuine comic elan.In a role that five years ago might have been played by Ben Stiller, Dillon again proves himself one of filmdom's most underrated actors. He makes credible the frequently woebegone Carl's transition from loving bridegroom to suspicious spouse.Viewers may wonder how Douglas' loathsome billionaire could be poppa of such a well-adjusted daughter, but Hudson makes you believe in Molly's good heartedness. She basically is called upon to react to her co-stars' capers, and she's an excellent reactor. Her silent glares are perfectly pitched.The cast provides the movie's merriment. But the hi-jinks are more fleeting than memorable.