Rubik's Cube is back, and it's as much of a brain-teaser as it was during the Reagan era.

For the movie "The Pursuit of Happyness," Hasbro Games landed the best sort of product placement there is: free. Not only that, but star Will Smith plays with a Rubik's Cube and masters it, as further confirmation of his character's persistence and intelligence.

Some factoids, courtesy of Hasbro:

The cube has 54 individual "pieces" or squares grouped in six colors: white, red, yellow, orange, blue and green. Through twisting and turning the sides in patterns known as algorithms, the object is to have each side a solid color.

Cube has 43,252,003,274,489,856,000 possible configurations. Only one is correct.

It bears the name of its inventor, Erno Rubik. He was a lecturer in the Department of Interior Design at the Academy of Applied Arts and Crafts in Budapest, Hungary.

The prototype dates to 1974 and Rubik applied for a Hungarian patent for a "Magic Cube" in '75. First test batches were made in late 1977.

During 1978, the Magic Cube spread through homes, playgrounds and schools in Hungary. In 1979, a deal was signed to bring it to the West. The cube was demonstrated at toy fairs in London, Paris, Nuremberg and New York in January 1980.

Ideal Toys renamed it and exported Rubik's Cubes in May 1980. More than 250 million have been sold around the world.

Two signs of the times: You can go to www.rubiks.com for more information, and the Rubik's Cube sent to the Post-Gazette was, of course, made in China.