Poor man’s Trading Places: It’s really tough to beat Trading Places, but Flirting With Disaster made a real strong go at it. It’s missing a few more laugh-out-loud lowbrow comedy moments, but otherwise it hits all the right places for a comedy.
★★★★☆
Josh and I convinced another friend to watch Flirting With Disaster before this review will come out. This is how I described Flirting With Disaster: Ben Stiller is searching for his birth parents. He’s brought his wife (Patricia Arquette) for emotional support and is being led by an incompetent social worker (Tea Leoni). Hilarity ensues. I compare this movie to Trading Places because it’s all set in the realm of the somewhat believable. As opposed to other comedies, such as, Zoolander, Little Nicky, or Airplane, which will never ever happen in real life.
The humor from this movie is situational comedy. In an early scene, Ben Stiller is late for a date with Patricia Arquette, who is waiting for him in lingerie. When Ben finally arrives, Patricia jumps him. However, unbeknownst to Patricia, Ben has brought his social worker home, and she’s waiting in the living room. Ben spends the scene going back and forth from the bedroom to the living room, pulling clothes on and off, a la Mrs. Doubtfire. There are many more scenes and situations like this that develop in this movie.
In addition to the actors named above, we have Alan Alda, Mary Tyler Moore, Lily Tomlin, Josh Brolin, Richard Jenkins, and George Segal – If you watch a bunch of movies, you’ll recognize the last two when you see them. This movie has a great cast and it has a younger David O. Russell at the helm as the writer/director. Overall, the movie is put together well. There are no scenes that don’t serve a purpose in forwarding the plot. The actors all have motivations that make sense, and the film is well shot: scenes meant to create tension do that and the scenes meant to make you laugh do that too.
The only reason that this movie isn’t a 5 star movie is that it’s missing some scenes that elicit a powerful belly-laugh. The movie is full of scenes that will make you giggle or make you smile and think “That’s so funny!”, but there are no scenes that are the perfect combination of funny and surprise and comic timing to really make you bust out laughing. I had to dry my eyes after watching that clip. IT’S PERFECT! From look on the prospective buyer’s face when Chris Farley lights the car on fire all the way to when Chris asks if they validate parking. That’s what this movie is missing. It’s all well crafted, very funny stuff, but there are no scenes or moments that really hit that sweet spot that makes you laugh so hard you miss the next joke on the first watch.
In the end, this is still a really good movie. I’m gonna recommend it to anyone who likes comedy that requires a little more thought than a Jackass movie. Nothing against Jackass, I like a good nut-shot as much as the next guy, but this movie requires a few more brain cells. Enjoy!
Flirting With Disaster is available to stream on Netflix! Check it out!
Next week Josh is watching Philomena. A review I saw called it “another hateful and boring attack on Catholics”. Fuck that guy. This movie is great. It’s got drama, it’s got comedy, it’s got Dame Judy Dench, and in the end, it’s all about a women reconciling her deep, deep Catholic beliefs with the pain the church has caused her. In the end, this movie gave me more respect for the Catholic faith.
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