Along Came Polly ('04) 2004, Rated R Universal

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A Universal Release. Written and directed by John Hamburg; starring Ben Stiller, Jennifer Aniston and Phillip Seymour Hoffman. Released to DVD on June 8, 2004.

From Jeff Daniels’ most unceremonious visit to Lauren Holly’s bathroom in Dumb and Dumber to Eddie Kaye Thomas’ mad dash to the wrong bathroom in American Pie to Mike Myers’ horrendously long and grunt filled trip to the bathroom in Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me, men crapping themselves silly is one action that has been well represented in Hollywood movies.  Despite this situation (and saturation), I am confident that somewhere, there is a film director who can look at a toilet and believably state, “Cinematically, there isn’t any more that can be done with this fixture.”  This much can be said of that director: he had absolutely nothing to do with Along Came Polly.

Ben Stiller stars here as Reuben Feffer, an insurance risk assessor who leads a calculated, risk-free and mostly boring life.  When his wife (Debra Messing) leaves him on their honeymoon, Feffer’s world is turned upside down.  Dismayed and depressed, Feffer then meets the free-spirited, devil-may-care, commitment phobe, Polly (Jennifer Aniston) and things begin to get really interesting.

Though he has been acting since 1987’s Empire of the Sun, Stiller has only been a member of Hollywood’s A-list for roughly five years.  Since shooting to stardom as the uncomfortable, awkward, oft befuddled and lovable Ted Stroehman in the Farrelly Brother’s film There’s Something About Mary, Stiller has rarely ventured forth from the dopey character type.  This is a shame, not only because Stiller has excelled in the straight roles he tackled in The Zero Effect, Your Friends and Neighbors and Permanent Midnight, but because his comedic creations all tend to blur together into one massive Stiller-ian male muddle.  Distinguishing Stiller’s roles in Duplex, Meet the Parents, Keeping the Faith, There’s Something About Mary and Along Came Polly is all but futile.  The unwanted consequence of this is that a large portion of the inherent originality in each of Stiller’s films is muted. Fortunately Along Came Polly’s writer/director John Hamburg, there isn’t very much unique material in his film.

Despite the general caustic tone I’ve adopted for the first three paragraphs of this review, the truth is Along Came Polly isn’t a bad film.  It is a conglomeration of scenes that have been lifted out of other and more enjoyable movies and TV shows (including Breakfast with Tiffany’s, While You Were Sleeping, Friends, There’s Something About Mary and Dumb and Dumber, to name but five) and frankensteined them together into an 80 minute long comedy.  In a sad twist, the most entertaining parts of Hamburg’s film were also the most original moments in the film.  While Stiller and Aniston played, essentially, Stiller and Aniston, Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Alec Baldwin and Hank Azaria stole the picture in their supporting roles as Reuben’s best friend, boss and nudist scuba instructor, respectively.  Hoffman, Baldwin and Azaria brought a manic and captivating energy to their roles that just wasn’t found anywhere else in the movie.

Along Came Polly is, with several exceptions, completely generic and bland.  But, as the studio hoped, it’s a relatively nice, comforting generic and bland.  Character traits and development are left to the broadest of brush strokes; we are supposed to want Ben Stiller and Jennifer Aniston to fall in love, not Reuben and Polly.  And in this respect, Along Came Polly is a stunning success: it is a comedy that delivers few original scenes and allows its story to progress in between toilet gags, jokes involving profusely sweating men, bathroom gags and still more toilet gags.

chris neumer

yes, it's true: Actor Hank Azaria delivers a wide range of voices on The Simpsons including Chief Wiggum and Moe Szyslak, Apu and Comic Book Guy.