Review: Along Came Polly (2004)
Written by: Brian J. Sumner
What if told you I had a script for a romantic comedy set in New York and I had Ben Stiller, Jennifer Anniston, Hank Azaria, AND Phillip Seymour Hoffman, among other great stars, signed up to appear in the film? Oh! And also Danny DeVito will help produce it? Not knowing what the story was about, what would you guess the rate of success for this film to be? 80%? 95%? Would it be a full fledged, certified fresh, clean sweep, 100% iconic film?? Well, I hate to disappoint you, but the film I just described was not the glowing masterpiece the casting sheet would have initially indicated.
Of course I’m talking about the 2004 “RomCom” Along Came Polly with Jennifer Anniston being the title character. She’s a free spirited, zero structure, live day to day kind of woman who happens to be an old schoolmate of the main character, Reuben Feffer, portrayed by Ben Stiller. Reuben is an actuary, which is a fancy word for someone who analyzes and compares risk with regard to determining approval for insurance coverage. He is so engrained within his work that he now assesses risk within his own life to such a degree that he doesn’t take any risks at all, making him kind of boring. When we’re introduced to Reuben, he is newly married and on his honeymoon with his bride, Debra Messing, in a tropical destination and life is looking pretty good for Reuben. So, what sort of storyline chaos happens at this point to kickstart our main story?? His new bride cheats on him with the French scuba instructor, Claude (played by Hank Azaria). Heartbroken and distraught, Reuben returns home to New York where his best friend, former child star (loose with the term “Star”) Sandy Lyle, tries to help him forget about his woes and move forward with his life. Enter Polly. It’s your typical romcom plot point; two characters with polar opposite personalities somehow finding love with each other. Yawn.
Along Came Polly ©2004 Universal Pictures
“Yawn.”
My problem isn’t with the movie being a RomCom. In fact, I would probably say I’m more pro-RomCom than I am anti-RomCom as long as the story is entertaining and makes sense within its own world. The problem I have with this film is the exaggerated-ness of certain aspects of the story and how the characters present themselves. It’s as if the majority of the characters were written one way, then when they went to film, each actor was given a character trait card (kinda like the game Party Quirks on Whose Line is it Anyway?) and instructed to take that trait and amplify it by 1000%. The silliness of certain parts of the story compounded by the ridiculousness of the character portrayals makes you zone out of the overall experience and has you looking at your watch more times than not.
Your prototypical Romantic Comedy follows a pretty straight forward blueprint:
⁃ Boy meets girl
⁃ Boy falls in love with girl
⁃ Friction arises between the two, typically due to terrible communication
⁃ An “Ah-Ha!” moment occurs where the boy realizes he screwed up
⁃ Sprinkle in some silly dialogue and situational humor
⁃ Boy and girl kiss and make up
⁃ Roll credits
But the key to having a great romantic comedy, is making the characters relatable and having great dialogue and character interaction to help push the story along. You don’t get either of those with this film and in reality, this story should have been geared more towards the comedy element, rather than a romantic comedy. The onscreen chemistry between Reuben and Polly is practically zero and none of the characters, ultimately, are that relatable with exception to Polly and maybe Sandy, whom we must mention was played by the late-great Phillip Seymour Hoffman. In fact, in my opinion, the only saving grace for this film is Phillip Seymour Hoffman and his comedic timing which was criminally underrated and overshadowed by his fantastic dramatic work. Hoffman handled comedy much like everything else he did in front of the camera. Perfectly. But his performance alone wasn’t enough to elevate this film and make it a memorable RomCom for future movie lovers to enjoy. While funny in parts, the romantic side of the film fell completely flat and the rest of the story relied too heavily on excessive plot points, unnecessarily eccentric character traits, and a 180 degree flip at the end to a slightly earnest but totally out of place “lesson to be learned” moment to close out the film.
What? I mean, seriously, what?
Along Came Polly fell victim to what a lot of other films in the genre have fallen victim to over the years; being entirely too deliberate with the comedy. A story like this benefits more from accentuating and elevating the romantic aspects to create a richness for the characters to evolve. Comedy within this structure will eventually find its way into the picture, you don’t have to force it! It also proves once again that just because you have an all-star cast lined up for your movie, it will more than likely not be enough to make up for a subpar script or a weak overall story.
Brian J. Sumner is the Host of Dude, What?!, author of The Secrets of Dr. Killiecrankie and a hopeless romantic in search of undying love for the perfect Comedy.
