This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

Let me be very fair here, this is not the best movie in my opinion. But, this movie is fun, it has purpose and is very enjoyable to watch.

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

The movie really just wants to entertain people.

Forgive me but it took a few times for me to really get this one. But, wow, this is a great movie. Wildly funny with a great cast. "Why does everything have to take so long?" is one of my all-time favorite movie lines. It's from 1981's forgotten but great "Four Friends". That not only describes the relationship of the two heroes but my own personal reaction to the great movie. Don't wait until Christmas to watch this one.

We all come across that film that usually belongs to a very stale and processed genre, which promotion and poster and actor lineup seem tedious in and of themselves... but that is actually really good. Hidden gems, if you will. It's a matter of the actors establishing good chemistry on the set, a real feeling of coziness and cohesiveness among the crew like the director and entire cast had time to grow into a comfort zone and produce a fully matured product with caricatured but detailed characters, an original soundtrack, etc.It's the sort of flick that wouldn't be anything without its very definite humor and gags though, despite the main narrative being actually quite original and a now cult classic theme (if not original, then one of the main "friendzone" concept films surely), and whether you like him or not, Ryan Reynolds brings his personal and unique touch to every movie set he enters. He and Anna Faris are hilarious here, some scenes genuinely some of the funniest stuff from that entire cinematic era I can think of and surely connected on a purely humorous level where they were completely comfortable around each other and managed some of the best onscreen one-two combo comedy. They'd also played together in "Waiting..." that same year, so, good chemistry and good complementary back and forth.Amy Smart does well also as the warm college crush/sweetheart many of us had growing up, but it's really the secondary characters that give this movie a major boost and fill in the blanks with comedic gusto when the protagonists aren't hogging up all the airtime: Chris Brander's mom (played by Julie Hagerty) is hilarious and hits so close to home as the overly naive and preoccupied mom ("well honey what on earth are you doing over at Joyce's ?!" -"be yourselllllffff !"), Dusty Dinkleman (Chris Klein): absolutely hilarious character. And you know the movie makers put in genuine heart and effort when the film has its own batch of original songs that depict a character's flaws: "When Jamie Smiles" as the "stalker's national anthem", or Samantha James' "Forgiveness". And then of course Reynolds in the intro (full version later during the ending credits) delivers the single most hilarious and comprehensively demolished singing-simulation cover I've ever seen of that deliciously putrid song "I swear" by..whatever boy's band at the time. The relationship Brander has with his most annoying and immature little brother also adds to the good fun and the relatable quality of the overall picture.Whenever this film given its nature was supposed to run out of funny-steam, it kept going - whenever it was supposed to finally look like a cardboard Hollywood disposable comedy, it held up well enough - whenever the cheesiness was supposed to kick in hard, it managed to keep its composure and not sell out. It manages to tell the truest story, deliver a genuine moral that doesn't collapse or sell itself too fast, while being quite honestly very funny even hilarious in parts and never stutter with its pace.This is surely too high a rating, but for this sort of film it indeed doesn't get much better than this: 9/10.

This movie is nothing but slapstick, stupid pratfalls, and gross jokes. I regret buying it, I regret the time I spent watching it, and I will never watch it again. The storyline is sad and unbelievable with nonprofit he Malory whatsoever. The acting is bad, there are dozens of sad stereotypes, and it was not NOT funny. Do NOT watch this horrible movie.

This basically serves as a vehicle for Ryan Reynolds and Amy Smart, and as romantic comedies go, it's not too bad. Anna Ferris was terrific as a crazy pop star. Reynolds gets stranded in his New Jersey hometown during the holidays and runs into his old friends, including his high school crush, who spurned him right before they graduated high school. They start to reconnect.This has several laugh-out-loud scenes, including a bed scene, a great "he shoots, he scores" transition scene, a pickup hockey game, and a scene where they try to kiss on the ice. It's a pretty good "guilty pleasure" film with good chemistry between the stars.** 1/2 out of ****