Not at all. What it means is that the star rating system is relative, not absolute. When you ask a friend if "Hellboy" is any good, you're not asking if it's any good compared to "Mystic River," you're asking if it's any good compared to "The Punisher." And my answer would be, on a scale of one to four, if "Superman" (1978) is four, then "Hellboy" is three and "The Punisher" is two. In the same way, if "American Beauty" gets four stars, then "Leland" clocks in at about two.

And that is why "Shaolin Soccer," a goofy Hong Kong action comedy, gets three stars. It is piffle, yes, but superior piffle. If you are even considering going to see a movie where the players zoom 50 feet into the air and rotate freely in violation of everything Newton held sacred, then you do not want to know if I thought it was as good as "Lost in Translation."

"Shaolin Soccer" has become a legend. It's the top-grossing action comedy in Hong Kong history, and was a big hit at Toronto 2002 (although for some reason I didn't see it; I must have been sidetracked by "Bowling for Columbine"). Miramax bought it, and shelved it for two years, apparently so Harvey Weinstein could cut it by 30 minutes, get rid of the English dubbing, restore the subtitles, and open it one week after his own "Kill Bill Vol. 2." To put this movie up against Tarantino is like sending Simon Cowell against William H. Rehnquist, but Simon has his fans.

The movie has been directed and co-written by Stephen Chow, who stars as Sing, a martial arts master turned street cleaner, who uses his skills in everyday life and is in love with Mui (Vicki Zhao), who sells buns from her little street stand and combs her hair forward to conceal a complexion that resembles pizza with sausage and mushrooms. It is a foregone conclusion that by the end of this film Mui will be a startling beauty. Less predictable is that Sing recruits seven soccer players from his former monastery to form a soccer team.