Wednesday

I have a memory of Along Came Polly receiving terrible reviews and doing quite badly at the box office. I remember they were mainly based around Jennifer Aniston and her character, Polly. When watching the movie last night I couldn't help agreeing with these reviews (imagined or not). She is intended to be a crazy counterpart to Ben Stiller's risk analyst, doing everything he could never do. But, in my mind, she's just not crazy enough. She: owns a half-blind ferret; eats spicy food; goes salsa dancing; dates people; moves around the world; eats peanuts from a bar bowl. Isn't this, more or less, what normal people do? I'm thinking they were afraid to make her too crazy in case they isolated the audience. I think their main problem was Aniston herself. Whilst I do think she's a good actress, this role wasn't right for her. Ben Stiller, however, was excellent as the cautious insurance salesman. Philip Seymour Hoffman (did you know he was in this?) does the best he can with a very strange role - and I think the first time I've seen him in a straight comedy. Otherwise, the problem is that it's just not that funny - the concept or the individual jokes. It does feel a bit like every other movie Ben Stiller's done: awkward guy does stupid things but eventually gets the girl. Sometimes it gets stuck between comedy and sincerity. There are some funny moments, but not enough. The ending, however, is a little more interesting than usual in that they don't decide on anything except maybe meeting for dinner sometime in the next week (the subsequent beach scene destroys this a little bit). Overall, ok.