Review of Flirting with Disaster (1996) by Leon B — 15 May 2015

Review:

It's always good to watch actors earlier work so you can see how far they have come. In this case I chose Ben Stiller who hasn't really changed his style of comedy that much since 1996. His mannerisms and silly face expressions are more or less the same but he's got bigger budgets to play with nowadays so he doesn't have to rely on his performances to much, like in Tropic Thunder and Night At the Museum. Anyway, this movie is about Stiller hunting for his biological parents after his wife gives birth to his son. With the help of his wife and his sexy adoption agency worker, who wants to film the whole event, they start there journey which has its ups and downs. The adoption agency ends up getting Stillers biological parents identify wrong so there journey becomes bigger then they first thought. When he finally tracks down his parents, the situation goes from bad to worse because of his parents weird habits and strange lifestyle. The movie was quite funny in parts but the storyline is extremely far fetched. The young Josh Brolin and his gay partner, played by Richard Jenkins, was quite a weird choice by the director but they played there parts quite well. I've always been a fan of George Segal and I liked the chemistry between Alan Ada and Lily Tomlin but I did lose interest after a while. Anyway, it's light hearted fun which is silly in parts, but watchable. Average!

Round-Up:

It's weird seeing Josh Brolin star in a comedy were he is playing a gay role after seeing him in butch movies like Oldboy, No Country For Old Men and Sin City. The movie was made earlier on in his career so I can't blame him for taking on the project. This was also made earlier on in Ben Stillers career and it really does prove that his range is limited because he hasn't progressed as a comedian that much. His films always gross a lot at the box office and with Rentaghost and Zoolander 2 in the pipework, he is still a bankable actor for the big studios. I know a lot of people that are fed up with his movies but I doubt that he will go down the same route as Jim Carrey and Eddie Murphy, who find it hard to pull in the big audiences nowadays. .

Budget: $7million.

Worldwide Gross: $15million.

I recommend this movie to people who are into their comedies about a man whose trying to find his biological parents so he can name his newborn baby. 4/10.