My last trip to the movie theater swallowed me whole, pummeled me in the guts and knocked me senseless before spitting me out and making its way to the Oscar podium. This was, of course, “Million Dollar Baby.” However, my next trip gave me quite a different feeling in my gut. If the word “nauseating” doesn’t mean anything to you yet, it might after the Vin Diesel-driven Disney vehicle, “The Pacifier.”

You have to admit that the idea to put Vin Diesel in a Disney movie seems inherently funny — in a pseudo-masochistic sort of way. Just the phrase “like Vin Diesel in a Disney movie” has a sort of oxymoronic ring to it. But actually going through with it is an entirely different matter.

When a professor working on a highly top-secret project for the defense department gets kidnapped, it’s up to Lieutenant Shane Wolfe (Vin Diesel) and his team of Navy SEALs to rescue him. Cue the jet skis, helicopters, and numerous back flips. But just when we think that the professor (Tate Donovan) has been saved, a stray bullet finds him and lands Shane in a situation he never bargained for — taking care of the professor’s family.

Now, I know what you’re thinking, “It’s only logical for the defense department to have a Navy SEAL move in with the professor’s family in order to take care of them. I mean, their lives could be in danger.” Okay, so maybe in a straight-up action movie their lives could legitimately be in danger, but this is a Disney-family-action movie. That can only mean that Shane will be doing diaper-duty with the professor’s five kids and their whacked-out Eastern European nanny (Carol Kane).

“The Pacifier” plays out as a mediocre rough-draft of a family film. The family’s mother (Faith Ford) is shipped off immediately to Switzerland to get an unknown item from a safety deposit box, and Shane is left to raise Lulu, Zoe, Seth, Peter, and Tyler — and of course each child has its own set of Disney-worthy problems. As Shane gets involved with the kids and their school, the film rapidly moves from “rather stupid” to “implausibly ridiculous.” And the scenes involving the school’s vice principal (Brad Garrett) are enough to make you

want to smack somebody — probably him, if you had the chance.

The main problem with “The Pacifier” is that it can’t balance its sense of reality with a genuine kitsch. Vin Diesel in a minivan can be funny. Vin Diesel singing bedtime lullabies can be painful. While there are some funny moments — or maybe just one (when the youngest daughter asks a large-chested Diesel why he has boobs), “The Pacifier” doesn’t really offer anything that is new, unpredictable, or that we haven’t seen before. Even the whole idea of putting an “action” star in a “family” setting, and waiting for hilarity to ensue has been done — we’ve all seen “Kindergarten Cop.”

Until Hollywood dreams up a better way to make family films more appealing, I’m going to have to stick with watching Oscar winners.

So while I break out my Pepto Bismol, you might want to make it a Blockbuster night.