Shazam’s tale of orphans and wizardry is not perfect — Sivana is a stylish but ultimately forgettable menace — but it’s pretty close.

A light, funny, grounded, engagingly unpretentious sleight-of-hand action comedy.

Shazam! is a lot of fun and it further proves how, in the wake of the success of Wonder Woman and Aquaman, DC’s movie future is indeed bright. Zachary Levi was born to play this superpowered man-child, delivering lots of laughs alongside sarcastic but amiable co-star Jack Dylan Grazer.

This heartfelt origin story is more than the sum of its immense charm and Spielbergian attention to detail.

This new DC entry has a lovely lightness, both in the visuals and in its tone.

Casting is a strong suit here, and even the incidental characters are distinctive and precise.

The hardest power to depict onscreen is the wisdom of Solomon, but Shazam! makes clever decisions, mixing middle school snark with disarming sweetness. And — yes — it delivers the requisite lightning-strike punch-’em-ups with considerable force.

Shazam! is basically two movies in one. One with Levi and his wiseass foster brother (a fresh Jack Dylan Grazer), the other with Strong and all his snarling, computer-generated gobbledygook. And they both have the other in a headlock, wrestling for the soul of the story. I loved one, yawned through the other.

While genre tropes are very much in play, there's a certain magic in this “Big”-meets-Superman affair where an ancient wizard transforms a troubled teenager into a buff, god-like guy with a light-up suit.

What is often the most businesslike part of a superhero origin story—establishing the hero’s powers — ends up becoming the most entertaining part of Shazam!, carried along by Levi’s fidgety, boyish charm. (Similarly, the inevitable climactic light-show showdown — a reliably butt-numbing staple of the genre—is surprisingly zippy.)