Time for bed," said Zebedee.

The makers of The Magic Roundabout film have taken the moustachioed, springy wizard's words to heart.

This computer-animated foray into the Enchanted Village will lull a sizeable proportion of the audience to the Land of Nod.

And anyone who manages to stay awake will be left wondering where the quirky and quintessentially British programme of our childhood has gone.

It's certainly not up there on the big screen.

As we enter the village, opera-mad cow Ermintrude (voiced by Joanna Lumley) is 'entertaining' the locals - including Florence (Kylie Minogue), near-comatose hippy rabbit Dylan (Bill Nighy) and her ardent admirer, bashful snail Brian (Jim Broadbent) - with an ear-shattering aria.

Cowardly canine Dougal (Robbie Williams) is far more concerned with satisfying his sugar craving.

To that end, he hijacks a tricycle laden with sweet treats and accidentally crashes the fast-moving contraption into the Magic Roundabout.

The collision unleashes Zebedee's ice-blue nemesis, Zeebad (Tom Baker), from his prison beneath the earth.

Zeebad has been incarcerated under the roundabout for 10,000 years and has revenge on his mind: specifically, to freeze the sun and plunge the world into total darkness.

His plan requires three special diamonds. If Dougal and the gang can reach the magical gems first, the dastardly scheme will be thwarted.

However, the chums will have to outwit Zeebad without Florence, who is frozen inside the roundabout with two children, or noble Zebedee (Ian McKellen), who has been cast into an icy abyss by his evil counterpart.

The Magic Roundabout looks strikingly similar to the cult TV series of old: all of the characters are uncannily rendered in digital form and vocal performers are matched neatly to their animated alter egos.

Nighy is delightful as dopey Dylan, having played a similar role as ageing rocker Billy Mack in Love Actually, and Broadbent and Lumley are the very epitome of pluck and blue-blooded bovine.

Even Williams brings a certain charm to his infuriating pooch.

Unfortunately, looks aren't everything; a lesson which the film, directed by the team of Jean Duval, Frank Passingham and Dave Borthwick, learns to its cost.

The screenplay can't decide whether to appeal to the little 'uns by introducing a wisecracking Train (Lee Evans) and slapstick, or cast an air of adult nostalgia, courtesy of Dylan's spaced-out asides.

In the end, the film appeals to neither camp, reducing the quest for the diamonds to a series of lack-lustre action set pieces.

The visuals are so polished and shiny that the characters lack the personality of their jerkily animated former selves.

When Zeebad refers disparagingly to Dougal as a 'dim-witted draught excluder', I'm afraid we have to agree.

DAMON SMITH