Entertainment

ORBITING THE SON

ONCE John Cusack was MTV; now he’s CBS. Still, a guy’s gotta make a living, and your arms are bound to get tired if you try to hold a boombox over your head forever.

In a sweet father-son heart-warmer called “Martian Child” – which works the tear ducts as expertly as an Irish barman dispensing Guinness – Cusack shows that he can still play the sensitive-but-fun guy until the ladies sigh and the men take notes.

He plays David, a rich sci-fi novelist who decides to adopt a boy after his wife dies. Joan Cusack – who by now can safely be named the world’s foremost portrayer of John Cusack’s big sister – and platonic best friend Amanda Peet give gently humorous advice. Says Sis, a mother of two swarming little males: “They’re like mosquitoes, sucking the life out of you.”

David, having once been a tiny weirdo with a rich fantasy life, picks an abused little boy (played by Bobby Coleman) from the orphanage. Said boy prefers to stay hidden in a box all day. His reason? He says he’s from Mars, and fears the damaging solar rays on what he calls “your planet.”

David lures him out with some SPF 45, a pair of sunglasses and an umbrella, at which point the kid begins to stroll, or perhaps mince, around the planet in his Kabuki whiteface, under his parasol. “He’s like a little Andy Warhol,” says the Peet character.

The boy also wears an improvised weight belt to keep him from floating away in our weak Earth gravity. It seems he was once cut loose – by another family.

“You’re just a freaky little dude,” says David, but his friend shrugs off the boy’s behavior: She was obsessed with the Von Trapp family as a girl.

“But did you go to school in lederhosen?” asks David.

“Yes. I did,” she replies.

In addition to speaking fluent Martian, the kid does little tricks. He can guess the color of an M&M without looking, and when he says a baseball player will hit a home run, he does. Could he be a real Martian? (And what does he mean when he keeps saying “they” are going to come back to get him some day?)

The movie, based on a sci-fi story by the author of the “Trouble With Tribbles” episode of “Star Trek,” has enough wit and unpredictability to hold your attention until it fades away with an “Is that all?” ending. Still, for little kids and moms, it’s a diverting visit to Planet Cute.

Running time: 108 minutes. Rated PG (mildly disturbing situations). At the 84th Street, the 34th Street, the Battery Park, others.