The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement

(Herald rating * * *)

A harmless fairytale for the mall-rat generation, the original starred Anne Hathaway as Mia, a typical American teenager brought up in a San Francisco fire station by her solo mum until Queen Clarisse of Genovia (Julie Andrews) turned up on the doorstep and revealed that Mia was her granddaughter and next in line to the Genovian throne.

The original used up almost all the cliches so Part 2 is more of a charmless fairytale. Now our girl is the beloved Princess Mia of Genovia, a kingdom somewhere between France and Spain, and she has a month to marry or lose her crown. Viscount Mabrey (John Rhys-Davies) wants to sideline Mia because his nephew, Sir Nicholas Devereaux (Chris Pine), is next in line.

Mia decides to marry for the love of her country, so they set her up with nice but dull Prince Andrew of Kensington and, as all fairytale heroines should, Mia says yes to him and sets about loathing the annoying but handsome Sir Nicholas. You guess who she'll marry.

The best thing to say about the DVD is that it will appeal to its tweenage market and push other Disney products.

DVD, video rental out now