See ‘Dick and Jane’ have fun … just not enough fun

See Dick. See Jane. See Billy, their little boy. See Spot, their family dog.

See their Beemers and their two-story Cape Cod.

See Dick climb the corporate ladder at Globodyne. See Jane quit her job as a travel agent. She can spend more time with Billy. He’s been taught to speak by their Hispanic housekeeper, the one with the speech impediment.

“Papi, what are joo doink with the televi-SION??

See Globodyne implode, Enron style. See Dick set up. See Dick take the fall.

With car payments and house payments and a kid in school and Dick’s pension and company stock now worthless, see Dick go bankrupt. And a little nuts.

All comedy is re-directed rage, and this “Dick and Jane” gets that.

An often-disguised Jim Carrey, left, and Tea Leoni, play a husband and wife who turn to robbery to pay bills in Fun

That’s the magic ingredient to the new Jim Carrey-Tea Leoni “Dick and Jane,” that flash of anger at something too many of us recognize: downward mobility. This is a goofy Jim Carrey comedy with an undercurrent of furious populism.

Dick Harper has been made a victim by an unscrupulous titan of business, played by a drawling Alec Baldwin. He was scape-goated on a TV business show just as his company was going into the tank. He can’t find a decent job. He can’t find a crummy job.

This film from the guy who gave us “Galaxy Quest” lets Dick take his shot at working for the new American corporate paradigm, the wage-and-benefit depressing Wal-Mart (called Kost-Mart, here). He can’t support a family on that, he screams. He spirals down to the very bottom rung of the ladder, day labor, hanging out with the undocumented.

Jane struggles to teach exercise classes she knows nothing about and hang on to landscaping she can’t pay for. That’s the key. When Dick resolves to take back their lawn (from neighbors, cemeteries, golf courses), he has discovered the secret. We’re back to “caveman” ethics. Get yours.

And Jane is down with this.

“You’re gonna need a good wheelman.”

They rob, amusingly, then hilariously. They don disguises (Bill and Hillary, the Unabomber, eventually scoring some neato voice-synthesizers).

They take out their humiliation on the greedy creeps who humiliated them.

The first “Fun with Dick and Jane,” back in 1976, was a so-so yuppie satire before the word “yuppie” had been invented. The new version has a healthy dose of hatred for the “winner take all” economy, and that general malaise that polls show most of us suffering from in the current economy.

In other words, Enron, Tyco, WorldCom and George W. Bush all have bit parts to play in this new Fun land.

But the movie is not quite angry enough, and certainly not funny enough. Slow to start, “Dick and Jane” works up a nice head of steam before settling into a closing caper that is more righteous than hilarious.

Still, Carrey delivers several deranged bits, especially with the voice-box gadget, and Leoni can hold the screen with him.

“Dick and Jane” are fun enough, just not nearly as much fun as they should have been. This is a comedy that’s all about the message. It needed to be more about the laughs.