Bill Murray shines in 'St. Vincent'

IF YOU'RE drawing a line between schmaltz and effective sentiment, it helps to put the pencil in the hands of folks like Bill Murray and Melissa McCarthy.

They're the headline stars of "St. Vincent,"" a movie that fairly dares you to crinkle your nose at its tear-jerking cliches - crusty curmudgeon in charge of an adorable child, orbited by a lovable wisecracking priest (Chris O'Dowd), even a hooker with a heart of gold (Naomi Watts).

Murray is Vincent, a belligerent boozy gambler in debt to his bookie (Terrence Howard), and so desperate for cash he impulsively agrees to babysit the child (local actor Jaeden Lieberher) of the frazzled single mom (McCarthy) who's just moved in next door.

"Vincent" the movie gets laughs from the comically scandalous behavior of the aging reprobate and impressionable child (Lieberher is a natural, and off-the-charts cute). Vincent introduces the boy to his prostitute girlfriend and to the racetrack, where they learn the details of parimutuel wagering and celebrate wins at the saloon.

The movie makes not entirely convincing efforts to darken the story - Vincent has secrets that soak up his limited reserves of subsurface humanity, and a past that perhaps explains and excuses some of his vices and anti-social behavior

It's up to Murray to make this character real enough to keep the viewer engaged, and this he does. With no small measure of help from McCarthy, who needed a role like this - tethered to reality, and not called upon to dance on a bar or run a jet ski into a dock.

The most quietly convincing feature of the movie is her single-mom desperation - she's often called to work a double hospital shift, and forced to rely on the cranky Vincent as a safety net.

Vincent is required to do things in the final reel that feel contrived, and the movie's resolution rests on a child's essay that no child could possibly have written. It results in a standing ovation for a beloved star that looks like a precursor to January's Golden Globe ceremony.

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