'Entourage' little more than padded TV show

“Entourage” is the kind of movie that succeeds merely by meeting — and fitfully exceeding — expectations. But, seriously, did anyone expect all that much?

Perhaps it was a foregone conclusion that a popular premium-cable series would absolutely, positively have to morph into a feature-length theatrical film. But even obvious cash grabs don't have to be lazy and cynical.

“Entourage,” for the most part, plays like a padded-out episode of the HBO show about the young actor Vincent Chase (Adrian Grenier), who arrived in Hollywood in 2004 to find his fortune, with a squad of his Queens homeboys in tow. The posse included best friend/manager Eric (Kevin Connolly), Turtle (Jerry Ferrara) and Vince's half-brother Johnny (Kevin Dillon), nicknamed “Drama” in honor of his self-seriousness as a Z-list actor.

The ensemble, continually on the hunt for the next beer and babe, was reportedly based on the real-life friends of Mark Wahlberg, who executive-produced the series (and shows up for a funny cameo in the movie). Their antics possessed the frisson of firsthand knowledge, as well as confoundingly contradictory messages and impulses: “Entourage” presented a repulsive tableau of swaggering, dimwitted entitlement. The viscous substance that held all the preening and posturing together was Vince's agent, Ari Gold, a tightly clenched fistful of rage, ego and barely concealed insecurity.

Portrayed by Jeremy Piven in a one-man personification of the fear that Hollywood runs on, Ari is a moderately compelling antihero, far more interesting than Vince and the callow fellows he hangs with. And, as he did in the show, Ari single-handedly saves the movie version of “Entourage” from “Medellin”-scale disaster.

As the film opens, Vince is on a yacht in Ibiza, recovering from an impulsive marriage and taking a break from directing his first movie. A few scenes later, writer-director Doug Ellin — who created the original show — provides a helpful primer in the characters' story arcs, enlisting Piers Morgan to interview Vince about his career, and jamming in all sorts of expository information about the guys in the process.

Eric is now due to be a father and Turtle has lost a lot of weight, but other than that, very little has changed in the “Entourage” universe, whose gravitational pull is a gaseous mix of booze, weed, overcompensating cars and the pervading funk of sexual anxiety and conquest.

Just when you think you couldn't care any less about any of it, Ari — who's now the head of a studio — zips in to give “Entourage” the jolt it needs, if not for redemption then at least for forward propulsion. Ellin tries to keep viewers' interest aloft by stuffing the movie with cameos, but it's Ari who earns the only legit interest or laughs.

Piven is so in the pocket as the smarmy, aggressive, inappropriate Ari that, when the movie he's in does little more than double down on the bro-ing out, the whiffed opportunities become all the more obvious.