Odd couple pairings of men have been a staple of movie comedy seemingly forever. The female odd-couple pairings are a bit more scarce -- but as shown by "Baby Mama," just as capable of lukewarm and predictable humor.

"Baby Mama" brings together old "Saturday Night Live" buddies Tina Fey and Amy Poehler as two women with different perspectives of their biological clocks.

Fey is warm and funny and sympathetic as Kate, a very successful 37-year-old businesswoman working for a chain of organic food stores. Business, however, forced her to postpone family, and now she wants a baby but has the dual problems of no man and a faulty uterus.

In desperation, she opts for a pricey surrogate mother program, which connects her with Poehler's Angie. Angie is poor white trash, saddled with a large dose of ignorance and an extreme loser of a deadbeat husband (an amusing Dax Shepard). Angie accepts Kate's fertilized eggs into her womb, but soon Kate is forced to accept Angie into her home -- and occasional moments of mild hilarity ensue.

I wouldn't call "Baby Mama" strictly a chick flick, but it's certainly a female-dominated comedy. Never thought I'd see Amy Poehler receive higher billing than Steve Martin in a movie. I didn't even know Steve Martin was in the movie until he showed up on screen "¦ in what turns out to be a shrewd and hilarious supporting performance as Kate's blithely arrogant, granola-chomping, new agey, billionaire boss.

Sigourney Weaver is also well-cast as the fertile mind behind the surrogate mother agency. Greg Kinnear is on board with the thankless job of generic boyfriend, similar to but less common than Hollywood's generic girlfriend gig.

"Baby Mama" could have been a train wreck, but it sidesteps disaster. It's occasionally sappy and thoroughly predictable by the end, but Fey is just plain likable and naturally funny, and she and Poehler milk enough comic moments about the tribulations of pregnancy to keep things moving.

Still, given the choice, I'd rather watch three episodes of "30 Rock" or 90 minutes of "Tina Fey's Best of Weekend Update."

Rental recommendation: If I told you what "Lars and the Real Girl" is about, you'd probably never watch it. So I won't ... just trust me and rent it. Grade: A.

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