How Ice Cube can star in the wonderful Barbershop, then follow that with a piece of unmitigated trash like Friday After Next is one of those movie mysteries that will never be solved, but must simply be endured.

Consider this fair warning: Even those beguiled by the modest charms of the first two Friday movies - 1995's Friday and 2000's Next Friday - will be hard-pressed to find similar enjoyment in this crass sequel. While all three films benefit from Cube's increasingly engaging and charismatic screen presence, the first added a breakout performance from Chris Tucker, while the second added new characters and even a little depth to the old ones. All Friday After Next does is make one pray hard that the franchise ends here.

Craig (Cube) and his cousin, Day-Day (a relentlessly irritating Mike Epps) are still living in the 'hood (in the rundown, ill-named Shady Palms apartment complex), working when they can, basically struggling through each day only so they can be that much closer to the next party. But here, their celebratory plans get short-circuited when a masked Santa breaks into their place on Christmas Eve and makes off with their presents and their rent money.

Things look rough for our guys, but there's hope: Their fathers, who run Bros. Bar-B-Q restaurant, have gotten them jobs as security guards at a strip shopping center; Craig figures all he and Day-Day have to do is impress their boss enough on this, their first day on the job, to earn an advance on their paychecks. That's going to be tough, though, since Day-Day - whom Epps portrays as a buffoon devoid of redeeming qualities - sees himself as the swaggering new sheriff in town and is determined to throw his weight around, even if that means terrorizing customers who haven't done anything except sing a few Christmas carols.

All this is preliminary, of course, to the big party Craig and Day-Day are still planning to throw that night, where libidos will be on red alert.

There's a relentless misogyny that's played for laughs throughout Friday After Next, and the humor wears thin quickly. Among the other sources of yucks are racial stereotyping (the new boss is a Middle Eastern caricature of the most demeaning kind), homosexual rape (courtesy of their landlady's muscle-bound son, who's just been released from prison) and old age, which apparently makes anyone the perfect butt for all manner of jokes.

At least there was some semblance of heart in the earlier Friday films (especially the first), an underlying fondness for the characters and the absurd situations they found themselves in. That emotion is missing entirely here, along with any humor above gutter-level. If you do insist on seeing this film, don't arrive late: the clever, animated opening credits are a stitch, suggesting a sprightliness of touch and winsome wickedness of tone that's missing from the rest of the movie.

Friday After Next

Starring Ice Cube, Mike Epps

Directed by Marcus Raboy

Released by New Line Cinema

Rated R (Language, drug use, raunchiness)

Time 85 minutes

Sun score *