ChanFamous I wanted to like it more than I actually did... But much of the humor totally escaped me and I walked out only mildly impressed.

Micah Lloyd Excellent characters with emotional depth. My wife, daughter and granddaughter all enjoyed it...and me, too! Very good movie! You won't be disappointed.

Brennan Camacho Mostly, the movie is committed to the value of a good time.

Isbel A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

wes-connors Before he can name his first-born son, neurotic New York entomologist Ben Stiller (as Mel Coplin) would like to meet his biological parents. When he's about to have sex with orally-stimulating wife Patricia Arquette (as Nancy), Mr. Stiller receives good news from horny adoption agency agent Tea Leoni (as Tina). His real mother has been located. Adoptive parents Mary Tyler Moore (as Pearl) and George Segal (as Ed) are miffed, but they know Stiller still considers them his parents. Stiller and the two young women discover the San Diego mother was a snafu and finally locate Stiller's real parents. They are affluent acid-heads Lily Tomlin (as Mary) and Alan Alda (as Richard). Tagging along are Ms. Arquette's bisexual classmate Josh Brolin (as Tony) and his lover Richard Jenkins (as Paul)...The latter receives a spiked piece of meat from Stiller's punkish younger brother Glenn Fitzgerald (Lonnie). Yikes! Whether it was intended or not, the meat-eating was nicely symbolic...Writer-director David O. Russell gets a highly-skilled cast for this comedy. The older generation is especially good at making the most of the material. When you've been around, you can add...The opening shows a New York City full of unappealing parents for Stiller. This is followed by an ode to Arquette's body. Slithering around in her underwear for an extended time, Arquette is quite arousing and should be not be concerned about retaining too much "baby fat." Mary Tyler Moore and George Segal play their early scene well, but the laughs are sputtering. The story doesn't really start until Stiller hits the road. Situation and set-up is important to comedy. The smaller stuff in "Flirting with Disaster" is fine, but the big picture is diverting. The story isn't about Stiller finding his real parents, of course. It's about whether or not he and Arquette will have sex with Ms. Leoni and Mr. Brolin. On that, this viewer was indifferent. Sex comedies can be a tough nut to crack.***** Flirting with Disaster (1996-03-22) David O. Russell ~ Ben Stiller, Patricia Arquette, Tea Leoni, Mary Tyler Moore

Roedy Green Most important is the cast. It is filled with familiar actors you just love to watch including Ben Stiller, Mary Tyler Moore, Ben Stiller, Alan Alda and Lilly Tomlin. It has a young, beardless, extremely sexy Josh Brolin looking a bit like Matt Damon. Patricia Arquette (Medium) is in it. Glenn Fitzgerald also plays a young hunk, but one so weird you could not really consider him attractive.The basic plot is Ben Stiller (Mel Coplin) travelling from place to place to find his birth parents. He runs into a number of possibilities each weird in his/her own way.Within this loose framework, it feels more like improvisation. Scenes just sort of peter out after a while. The humour is the characters running out their day-to-day (but weird) behaviour. There are not many site gags or bon mots. It is just the fun of watching weird people reacting to unfamiliar situations. I think I laughed hardest at Téo Leone with her long legs like an ostrich striding to get away from a crazed truck driver. She had to look elegant even when her life was at stake.One of the themes is adultery, just what constitutes adultery, and what you should do about it both as adulterer and adulteree. Poor Ben breaks in on a very handsome man licking his bored wife's armpit. How should he react? Etiquette books don't cover this.It is a very gay friendly movie given that in was made in 1996. Homosexuality is treated as just one more comic opportunity. The two gay characters are quite far from the stereotypes. That treatment was refreshing and funny.It is a bit of a sloppy movie, but it is fun just the same.

bobsgrock Flirting with Disaster is a true companion to classic screwball comedies of the 1930s and 1940s. Not too unlike Howard Hawk's Bringing Up Baby or His Girl Friday, David O. Russell's outrageous and often funny comedy takes its absurd and wild tone to the very end, seemingly slamming on the brakes just at the moment when we feel as if there is more to learn about these characters. This may be true but Russell's intention is to show us their behavior in this particular instance, that is finding Mel's (Ben Stiller) parents.Films like this depend almost entirely on the acting and writing for success. Fortunately, here they both are superb. The cast alone makes the film worth checking out. Stiller, Patricia Arquette, Tea Leoni, all the way down to Josh Brolin and Richard Jenkins as a couple of federal agents make their characters as weird, interesting and watchable as any comedy of the last 20 years. What also succeeds is the pacing of Russell's script, which is light on drama but moves at such a rampant speed that you barely have time to catch your breath in between jokes and situations. Needless to say, this film is a treasure. Not much more can be said without ruining the marvelous surprises and bizarre circumstances it has to lay out. All that is required is to turn off your conceptions of coincidence, realism and contrivance and simply enjoy a most enjoyable story about a man looking for identity and realizing perhaps he shouldn't have.

slcagnina I am amazed that this film is not in IMDb's top 250.I rented this years ago, back when video was around, and it was the only film I ever rented where I rewound the tape and immediately watched the whole thing again. Everything works. The cast is perfect, the writing is perfect. Most comedies are lucky to be funny -- Flirting works as an incisive story about a marriage going thru a tuff patch -- it could have been an excellent drama -- and as a screwball comedy. Is there another movie that does that? I can't think of one. This is a modern classic. It's awesome. It's unique. 20 years from now, will anyone remember Forget Sarah Marshall? I liked that film, but 20 years from now, it'll be lucky to be a footnote. Flirting will be remembered and watched. Trust me. Bringing up Baby wasn't a success upon release. But it's a classic that endures, and so will Flirting. One day, it will be in that top 250. Time usually corrects.