A gooey morass of indie-movie clichés, the wacky-family dramedy “The Hollars” marks yet another egregiously cutesy attempt to rekindle that “Garden State” magic.

John Krasinski, who also directs, plays a New York graphic novelist who returns home to the Midwest, where his mom (Margo Martindale) is suffering from a brain tumor, his dad (Richard Jenkins) is going bankrupt and his brother (Sharlto Copley) is spying on his ex-wife. Oh, and Krasinski’s girlfriend (Anna Kendrick) is pregnant, but he isn’t psyched about that.

Nonstop wacky movie behavior — people being wheeled giggling out of hospitals, eight-hour cab rides, a family bursting into an Indigo Girls song — never succeeds in being funny, just strained, while the dramatic scenes are as cloying as the indie-rock soundtrack Krasinski slathers over everything. The whole project feels like it’s been lying around since Blues Traveler and Soul Asylum were hot.