Excepting Sinn Fein groupies, women have only ever found excessive facial hair to be a turn on during the neolithlic era and for a brief demented spell during the late 1960s when Terence Stamp was enjoying his heyday and the LSD was kicking in. Hence, one of the great enduring mysteries of science fiction – how the fuck did the beardy bloke off Star Trek; The Next Generation (Jonathan Frakes) always manage to cop off with all the foxy alien chicks in fuck-me boots?

Given the implausibility of his John Majoresque stature as a sex-symbol, Mr. Frakes has wisely chosen to stay on the other side of the camera post-Trek, and has accumulated many directorial credits predominantly in such lobotomised TV fodder as Roswell. His latest venture is Clockstoppers, a Spy Kids-style romp from the children’s channel Nickleodeon; it’s an underwhelming affair centred on two squeaky teens who discover a wristwatch which has the ability to stop time. And what pray, do the duo get up to with this awesome power? They play pranks on their mates while being chased by a nefarious technocrat, of course.

Unsurprisingly, it amounts to a fairly frivolous teen flick that goes nowhere special as loudly as possible. Still, if it’s keeping Jonathan Frakes’ beard off our screens we can only be grateful.