The Peacemaker arrives on screens under considerably more scrutiny than an average late-September action release. First of all, it's the inaugural motion picture release from Steven Spielberg, Jeffrey Katzenberg, and David Geffen's studio, DreamWorks SKG, launched with much fanfare three years ago. The second concern is one that was not foreseen at the time of the film's production: the questionable box office bankability of lead George Clooney, whose popularity on television's ER has not translated into blockbuster box office grosses for From Dusk till Dawn, the underrated One Fine Day, and the justly maligned stinkbomb Batman & Robin. So does this Tom Clancy-esque thriller deliver the goods under pressure? Yes--it's certainly exciting enough to leave audiences sufficiently entertained for a couple of hours, but that's all.

But what can you expect when the basic plot of Michael Schiffer's screenplay (based on, as the credits read, "an article by Andrew and Leslie Cockburn") is as thin as they come (OK, maybe not as thin as Twister's)? A cache of nuclear warheads is stolen from a train in Russia, and it's up to Special Forces intelligence officer Col. Thomas Devoe (Clooney) and the head of the White House Nuclear Smuggling Group, Dr. Julia Kelly (Nicole Kidman) to recover them, setting up one big globe-hopping chase after the weapons and the terrorists who stole them.

Schiffer and director Mimi Leder don't take this story in any new directions; familiar action staples such as car and helicopter chase sequences, running through crowded streets, big explosions, and (would a bomb thriller be complete without one?) a hurry-the-hell-up-and-disarm-the-bomb-before-we-all-blow-up-to-kingdom-come scene are present here. And some touches cannot help but remind one of some of the cast and crew's previous credits: Leder's extensive steadicam use recalls her ER work; a prolonged piano-playing scene, complete with closeups of fingers on keys, reminds one of co-star Armin Mueller-Stahl's Shine; and Devoe and Kelly encounter a character named--gag--Schumacher. But Leder directs it all with a fairly quick pace and high energy level, most notably in the opening hijack scene and a rousing car chase/demolition derby in the streets of Vienna.

Similarly energized is Clooney, who fits this role much more snugly than his infamous last. His self-effacing manner feels more at home here than it did for the Caped Crusader, but this is not to say that he's smiley and jokey all of the time. When called on to do action hero derring-do, he's up to the task, making good on the largely forgotten "serious action" promise he displayed in Dusk. Thankfully, no contrived romantic angle is developed between Devoe and Kelly, but that's even more for the better here since little spark of any kind develops between Clooney and Kidman, who seems a little ill-at-ease here. Granted, she isn't given anything really strenuous to do here (unless you count swimming laps), but something is clearly, oddly amiss when her usually flawless American accent slips into her natural Aussie every now and again.

With little competition in the action arena right now, the solidly made The Peacemaker should keep Clooney's film career afloat (for now, at least) and get DreamWorks Pictures off on a successful start--but the film still can't help but feel like somewhat of a letdown. It is a sturdy, entertaining popcorn movie, and while that may be good enough for any other studio at any other time, as the maiden film voyage of S, K, and G's much-hyped zillion-dollar enterprise, it's a dismayingly nondescript piece of formula product.