Try as she might, Jennifer Aniston is not a movie star. Yet she clings stubbornly to the dream, hoping to find Friends-size success on the big screen. She sure won’t achieve it with The Bounty Hunter, a lazy, tired and utterly charmless high-concept romantic comedy co-starring Gerard Butler.

Butler plays the title character, a former cop thrilled with the idea of bringing in ex-wife Aniston, a newspaper reporter who misses a court hearing to chase down potential leads for a story about the alleged suicide of an actual cop.

The concept has potential, but the film itself is mediocre at best, and only reaches that level because of a few mildly amusing moments early on, like the sight of Aniston in high heels trying to flee from Butler, or when Butler tells Aniston he knows when she’s fake crying. There’s also a nice scene between Butler and Christine Baranski, who appears as Aniston’s mother.

Butler is the funnier of the pair, but that’s not saying much, since Aniston (who looks fantastic) seems generally uninterested in being here. As well the characters they play are too unlikable, and so I never, ever cared if they got back together, which, after all, is the point of watching rom coms.

And while I liked the short car chase involving the leads and the main bad guy (Peter Greene), the violence in general–including a shootout near the end–feels out of place in what’s meant to be a lighthearted enterprise. The thing lacks energy, too, which is hardly surprising considering it was directed by Andy Tennant, the hack behind Hitch and Fool’s Gold.

Aside from Baranski, the only other person to earn some laughs here is Siobhan Fallon as the secretary of Butler’s bail bondsman boss (an annoying Jeff Garlin). For sure she’s funnier than Jason Sudeikis as Aniston’s creepy colleague/stalker, and less grating than Cathy Moriarty’s bookie, though I did chuckle when one of Moriarty’s henchmen got punched out by a stripper. – [DVD] [Blu-Ray]

Action/Comedy/Crime/Romance

Rated PG-13

DVD Release Date: 7/13/10

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , ,