Bullock is back in role that suits her, for now

Sandra Bullock enters "The Proposal" as Meryl Streep and comes out as Lucille Ball. In between, she feverishly attempts to avoid the fate of Meg Ryan.

Bullock is still that irresistible non-Hollywoodish tomboy kind of girl every guy's mother would like him to bring home to meet the family. She can do no mean.

But, career-wise, she has a problem. Bullock's fans only want to see her in light romantic comedies. When she plays serious dramas, she tends not to be Sandra Bullock. Meanwhile, time marches on.

She had those thrillers in which she attempted to get us tense about how fast she could type Internet messages to beat the bad guys. Flopped. She was less than exciting when she went through some kind of time warp with Keanu Reeves in that movie about the mysterious lake house. (Her fans didn't want to be bothered with figuring it out. They just wanted to hug Sandy.) She was believable as a hardened wife in "Crash," but it was an ensemble cast, not a Bullock vehicle.

She once told me, to my face, that she was not doing another romantic comedy. She wanted to move on. That was then. This is "The Proposal."

As sad as it might be, romantic comedies require sweet, young, perky girls. Meg Ryan, once America's sweetheart, learned - painfully - that her public only wanted her in light films and that she couldn't cross over into dramas. Haven't seen Missy Ryan lately.

Hopefully, the same fate will not afflict Sandy.

"The Proposal" is a pleasant enough comedy, although it has a lot (perhaps too much) of filler material to stretch it to feature length. It doesn't really do much in the way of developing its somewhat intriguing basic idea: A powerful career woman in New York City forces a young stud to marry her in order to prevent her from being deported to Canada.

As Margaret Tate, Bullock is the boss lady of a New York publishing firm. When she walks through the office, her cubicle-trapped employees quickly post e-mail warnings: "The Witch is on the Broom." They call her "Satan's Mistress."

This is Streep in "The Devil Wears Prada" all over again, and it's quite funny. Her dutiful gofer assistant, who quivers and quakes at her every whiff, is played by the fastest-rising new comedy and action star in the hunk market, Ryan Reynolds. It is he who gets the proposal.

Reynolds obviously works out and has looks that make Brad Pitt seem plain. He can do action (stealing a couple of scenes even from "Wolverine" lately), and he has fine comic timing. His movie "Definitely, Maybe" was one of the best comedies of the past year (and should have done better at the box office). On top of that, in real life, the guy recently married Scarlett Johansson. Talk about a guy who has everything! He doesn't really need to steal a movie from Bullock. But he does.

Conflict is always good for comedy. Bullock and Reynolds aren't Tracy and Hepburn, but they get it on pretty good in the barb vs. barb arena. It's "The Taming of the Shrew" in modern terms.

Although she's found time to fire her office competition, she neglected to get her immigration work permit updated. As a result, she may be sent to Canada. In order to prevent this, she orders her assistant (Reynolds) to marry her, pronto. They'll get a quickie divorce later and keep it all this side of the border.

Since he wants her to publish his book, he goes along with the scheme. The tag line for the movie is: "Bring on the Bribe."

As it turns out, he, secretly, is from an ultra-wealthy Alaskan family that includes Betty White as his lively grandma, Mary Steenburgen as his mom and Craig T. Nelson as the father who thinks his only son should give up noisy New York and come home to run the family businesses. When the bickering couple go to Alaska to visit his family, it all reverts to silly comedy time.

Since writer Pete Chiarelli isn't particularly savvy when it comes to wit, poor Sandy has to do things like save the family dog from an Alaskan eagle, dance with Grandma and be ogled by the local male stripper. That's when it becomes Lucille Ball time. Bullock proves to be a game clown, even in high heels that look perilous.

The appeal of this movie depends entirely on the charm of its two stars. For fans of the genre, it is enough. You can do worse than spending an hour and 40 minutes looking at these two people.

Mal Vincent, (757) 446-2347, mal.vincent@pilotonline.com