LITTLE ONES WILL HAVE FUN TILL THE COWS COME HOME.

Byline: Bob Strauss Film Critic

There's some fun stuff in ``Barnyard.'' But most of it isn't for all ages.

The Nickelodeon cartoon is the brand's first to feature an all-adult voice cast. But this simple story of farm animals who secretly walk upright, talk, sing and go joyriding when humans aren't paying attention is pretty much aimed at the younger end of the kid channel's demographic.

Colorful and energetically silly, a little scary and shot through with reassuring and worthy life lessons, it's an untaxing children's movie formula all the way.

Kevin James voices cow-about-town-and-country Otis (yes, there are boy and girl cows, and all sport udders). He just wants to have a good time at the barn dances the critters stage after the farmer's gone to bed. How the animals get a buzz on is never revealed, but we assume some kind of fermented feed has been discovered.

Anyway, Otis' ultra-responsible pops Ben (wonderfully voiced by Sam Elliott) wishes his son would settle down and help guard all their chicken, rodent and pig friends from marauding bands of coyotes. Of course, circumstances lead to Otis getting tested by precisely that task.

In the interim, there's time for wooing (mooing?) a sweet, pregnant heifer (Courteney Cox), getting back at some cow-tipping brats and meeting mostly uninteresting sidekicks, the species-nonspecific Wild Mike being the exception to that rule (he's kind of the Tasmanian Devil crossed with Cousin Itt). Probably the high point for older viewers will be Elliott lending his resonant rock of a voice to a cover of Tom Petty's ``I Won't Back Down.''

Steve Oedekerk, the brains behind Nick's ``Jimmy Neutron'' franchise, wrote, produced and directed ``Barnyard.'' He does some mildly clever things with the concept of animals only fooling us stupid humans into thinking they're dumb, but it's the kind of movie that leaves you feeling like more could have been done with the central idea.

You'll enjoy dropping the kids off at this one.

Bob Strauss, [phone]

bob.strauss(at)dailynews.com

BARNYARD - Two and one half stars

(PG: mild violence)

Starring: Voices of Kevin James, Courteney Cox, Sam Elliott, Danny Glover, Wanda Sykes.

Director: Steve Oedekerk.

Running time: 1 hr. 30 min.

Playing: In wide release.

In a nutshell: OK cartoon for the smaller kids, not much here for anyone else.

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Farm animals walk upright, do flips and have plenty of fun when humans have their backs turned in the kid-pleasing ``Barnyard.''