Dying is easy, comedy is hard, as the saying goes. A comedy about dying, especially a British farce, requires a specifically light, deft touch, which director Frank Oz achieves only about half the time in ''Death at a Funeral.''

Working from a script by first-timer Dean Craig, Oz has crafted a film that's either riotously funny or painfully draggy and nothing in between (though it's certainly more in line with his better work, like ''Bowfinger,'' than his last movie, the ill-advised remake of ''The Stepford Wives'').

Despite the brief running time, all that stopping and starting may leave you checking your watch more than once. And as the absurd situations build to a crescendo at a supposedly proper funeral at an English country estate, Oz can't help but push it to the extreme with a scatological gag that will make you cover your eyes, it's so uncomfortable to watch.

The ensemble cast is solid, though, led by Matthew MacFadyen (the hunky Mr. Darcy from the 2005 version of ''Pride and Prejudice'') as Daniel, a son of the deceased man trying to keep his estranged family together if only for this one supposedly solemn occasion. Rupert Graves plays his brother, Robert, a famous and famously selfish novelist who spent all his money flying first class from his New York penthouse, with Keeley Hawes (MacFadyen's real-life wife) as Daniel's wife, Jane, who's anxious for them to move out of the family home and into their own flat. Like, now.

Other relatives who've come to pay their respects, though they're mainly thinking of themselves, are Martha (a smart, feisty Daisy Donovan) and her lawyer fiance, Simon (Alan Tudyk, one of the few Americans in the cast, doing a fine British accent and snagging the flashiest role). Simon hopes to impress Martha's judgmental doctor dad (Peter Egan), whose brother is the deceased, but instead ends up stripping naked in a hallucinatory state after taking a pill he thought was Valium but was actually a concentrated form of acid, which Martha's wannabe chemist brother (Kris Marshall) concocted.

And that's only one branch of the family tree.

There's also whiny Howard (Andy Nyman), who's obsessed with some weird, discolored patch of skin on his wrist, and Howard's skeevy friend Justin (Ewen Bremner), who's obsessed with Martha, with whom he enjoyed a one-night fling. Meanwhile, Martha is obsessed with getting Simon off the roof and back into his clothes (though the moment she finds him sitting cross legged on top of the house, like ''The Thinker'' in the buff, is classic).

Into this twisted familial mix comes Peter (Peter Dinklage), the diminutive stranger who shows up and eyes the crowd suspiciously before stalking Daniel with some urgent news he longs to share. Seems Dad wasn't the man his wife (Jane Asher) and sons thought they knew. Toward the end of his life, he had some secret interests - and Peter has the photographic proof.

Oz pinballs between all these characters and their subplots; sometimes he's right on target, other times the humor feels strained. A prolonged, graphic toilet scene involving crass, cantankerous Uncle Alfie (Peter Vaughan) is the height of desperation, or perhaps the depth.

But ultimately ''Death at a Funeral'' settles down and goes soft and gooey. All that social satire was just a game, you see - the real message here is one of love and forgiveness and understanding. Like old Uncle Alfie, ''Death at a Funeral'' ends up having a lot bark but no bite left.

''Death at a Funeral,'' an MGM release, is rated R for language and drug content. Running time: 90 minutes. Two stars out of four.

By CHRISTY LEMIRE AP Movie Critic

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