For the most cautious man on Earth, life is about to get interesting.
Distributed by
Universal Pictures Video
Cert:
Cat.no: 8222961
Running time: 86 minutes
Year: 2004
Pressing: 2004
Region(s): 2, PAL
Chapters: 20 plus extras
Sound: Dolby Digital 5.1, DTS 5.1
Languages: English
Subtitles: English
Widescreen: 1.85:1
16:9-Enhanced: Yes
Macrovision: Yes
Disc Format: DVD 9
Price: £19.99
Extras:
Deleted scenes, Outtakes, Making of, Original opening, Rodolfo Goes To Hollywood, Trailer, Audio Commentary
Director:
John Hamburg
(Along Camp Polly, Safe Men, TV: Undeclared)
Producers:
Danny DeVito, Michael Shamberg and Stacey Sher
Screenplay:
John Hamburg
Music:
Theodore Shapiro and Andrew Lloyd Webber
Cast:
Reuben Feffer: Ben Stiller
Polly Prince: Jennifer Aniston
Sandy Lyle: Philip Seymour Hoffman
Lisa Kramer: Debra Messing
Stan Indursky: Alec Baldwin
Claude: Hank Azaria
Leland Van Lew: Bryan Brown
Jennifer Anniston's films fall into two categories
- "Rachel from Friends" and "well worth watching". Sadly, this is not the
latter, although the only one that did hit the spot was
The Good Girl.
In Along Came Polly, professional risk assessor Reuben (Ben Stiller) is getting married to his
other half of nearly five years, Lisa (Will & Grace's Debra Messing), but things go wrong
immediately on their honeymoon when she cops off with sleazy scuba instructor Claude
(Hank Azaria, who does many a voice for The Simpsons), and so before long he's
back home, bumps into old school friend Polly (Jennifer Aniston), they go salsa dancing,
go for meals, and do all the usual dating things, with occasional comic off-shoots.
It has some funny moments, such as when he's with his best friend Sandy (Philip Seymour Hoffman),
an ex-Brat-Pack actor who has a reality film crew following him around, go playing 1-on-1 basketball
and Reuben gets covered in sweat from one of their opponents, plus later when Reuben's Mum brings
up the subject of his slutty wife at an impromptu dinner with Polly, as well as a Breakfast Club
pastiche.
That said, it's all predictable stuff and passes 90 minutes easily but it's not a particularly funny
comedy throughout and it doesn't engage in the romantic stakes as there's no chemistry in either
couple. Alec Baldwin does a reasonable turn as a domineering boss and Bryan Brown
very sporty CEO of a big company, his action antics shown as he goes BASE jumping and plays a violent
squash game. Once it's over, it's not the most memorable, nor recommendable, film I've seen this year.
In addition, and this is a spoiler, it even has the same ending as Friends where Jennifer
Aniston is leaving town, and the male half of the couple goes running off after her.
There's no problems with the picture, which is in the original 1.85:1 widescreen ratio and is
anamorphic. Soundwise, again, Universal have included a DTS soundtrack and, while it doesn't make
a massive difference here, it's always good to see it included.
The extras on this DVD are listed below. Any film clips are 1.85:1 letterbox, while
non-movie footage is in 4:3 :
Original Opening (1½ mins):
We see where Reuben works, rather than starting with the wedding preparations,
but we get the idea of his company, and we see it later on anyway, so this
isn't really required.
Rodolfo Goes To Hollywood (4½ mins):
A rather pointless featurette cutting all the clips together that prove the
film's ferret is blind - so lots of bumping into things. This was funny the
first couple of times as part of the main feature, but went on a bit after
that.
Deleted Scenes (6 mins):
Seven scenes, but nothing that would've changed the dynamic of the film in any
way. I might've put back in the last two of the restaurant parking lot and
Reuben talking to his boss, but that's about it.
Outtakes (4½ mins):
Lines are fluffed. Contains spoilers so watch after the film.
Making of Along Came Polly (10½ mins):
Nothing deviating from the usual. Film clips mixed in with chat from principal
cast and crew members.
Trailer (2½ mins):
In 1.85:1 letterbox, and contains a clip from the parking lot deleted scene that
didn't make it to the final movie.
Audio commentary:
with director John Hamburg.
Subtitles are in English only, there are 20 chapters and the menu features
a few clips from the film rotating until you've had enough of them. You also
get moments from the movie intersecting with the menus when selecting different
options which is quite cleverly done.
DVDs reviewed by the editor are watched on a Panasonic TXW32R4 32" widescreen TV
connected to either a Creative Dxr2 DVD-ROM player or Microsoft Xbox and
played through a Sony STR-DB930 amplifier.
PC games reviewed by the editor are on:
Since Nov 2005: Intel Pentium D 830 3.0Ghz, 1Gb RAM, 128Mb nVidia GeForce 6700XL, Windows XP
Since Aug 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.66Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb GeForce4 MX440 graphics, Windows XP
Since May 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.6Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb ATI Radeon 9600TX graphics, Windows XP
Since Jun 2002: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, 64Mb ATI Radeon 8500LE
Since May 2000: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, Voodoo 3 3000 AGP
