List Price: $14.99You Pay Only: $12.99 You Save: $2.00 (13%)Prices subject to change.
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1
Audience Rating: R (Restricted)
Binding: DVD
EAN: 0786936237641
Format: Anamorphic, Collector's Edition, Color, DVD-Video, Widescreen, NTSC
Label: Miramax Home Entertainment
Manufacturer: Miramax Home Entertainment
Number Of Items: 1
Publisher: Miramax Home Entertainment
Region Code: 1
Release Date: June 01, 2004
Running Time: 93 minutes
Sales Rank: 16926
Studio: Miramax Home Entertainment
Theatrical Release Date: March 22, 1996
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Editorial Review:
Description:
Written and directed by David O. Russell (THREE KINGS, SPANKING THE MONKEY), this hysterically original comedy was cheered by critics and audiences nationwide. In a quest to find his biological parents, Mel Coplin (Ben Stiller, DUPLEX, MEET THE PARENTS) -- joined by his wife (Patricia Arquette, HUMAN NATURE, HOLES), and a sexy adoption counselor (Téa Leoni, PEOPLE I KNOW, HOLLYWOOD ENDING ) -- embarks on a cross country search for his 'roots.' Yet as he careens from one outrageous situation to another, Mel finds himself tempted by the seductive counselor -- even as his wife starts a flirtation of her own! By the time they meet up with his free-spirited birth parents, the whole situation is spinning hysterically out of control! Also starring Mary Tyler Moore, Alan Alda, and Lily Tomlin, this hilarious hit is sure to entertain everyone!
Amazon.com:
Sometimes a filmmaker's second movie gets labeled as a sophomore slump. David O. Russell (Spanking the Monkey) shreds that fate with Flirting with Disaster, an outrageous, free-spirited comedy about private people forced into public situations. Mel Coplin (Ben Stiller) finds the opportunity he's been waiting a lifetime for: an adoption agency rep (Téa Leoni) has located his birth parents and the agency will fly him to California if they can record the reunion. With wife Nancy (Patricia Arquette) and new son in tow, the neurotic Mel is compelled to discover his origins, despite the protests of his neurotic adoptive parents (a wonderful Mary Tyler Moore and George Segal). To give away the plot any more would be a crime, but as the title states, Mel is on a collision course of Oedipal proportions. Russell, who made incest an intriguing black-comedy topic in Spanking, is very liberal with sex and permits dangerous situations. His characters mix it up at a moment's notice. The two women along for the ride are not just bit players: Leoni (Deep Impact) keeps her high-energy comic routine flying, while the grounded Arquette keeps the baby in arm, despite the mad wanderings of her husband. Stiller is a perfect comic foil. --Doug Thomas
Customer Reviews
Average Rating: 
Rating:  - One of my absolute favorites!
Quirky, smart, unpredictable. What a blast to watch, over and over again! If you haven't seen this movie, you absolutely have to. One of the most entertaining movies I've ever seen.
Rating: - Funny
Ben Stiller was actually cute in this film. I don't think of him as a cutie, just as funny, which he is stinking funny. but, tonight, my dear hubby, Norman, and I watched this delightful movie and Ben was Cute!
Also, cute were Tia Leoni, Patricia Arquette, and the unnamed baby. The cast of stars they meet on the way - Mary Tyler Moore, Lily Tomlin, George Segal, Alan Alda, the 2 gay friends - all were a hoot!
A comedy of errors, boo boos, fumbles, sexual attractions gone wrong, parents that make their kids crazy, and the hillarious stay in a B & B - all kept me and my man laughing out loud. It kept our attention, was funny, sweet, and a great night at the movies, ala sofa and ice cream in the living room.
see it. loads of fun!
Rating: - Character-Driven Screwball Farce Still Shines with a Stellar Cast
Absent since 2004's misbegotten I Heart Huckabees, filmmaker David O. Russell made a ramshackle screwball farce back in 1996 that's well worth revisiting on DVD, at least until his next film comes along. He was able to blend character-driven humor with moments of pure slapstick as he tracks the misadventures of Mel Coplin, a neurotic entomologist on a frantic search for his birth parents to resolve his long-standing issues with identity. Tina Kalb, a leggy, off-kilter adoption agency worker thinks she's found Mel's mother in San Diego, so Mel, Tina, and Mel's sweetly frumpy wife Nancy, nursing their five-month baby, embark on a journey that becomes ever more haphazard with every turn of events. Unsurprisingly, an attraction develops between Mel and Tina, who is anxious to get pregnant herself. They meet a gallery of eccentric characters in what becomes a memorably wacky road trip. The real coup with this underappreciated film is the casting. Long before he sold himself up the river with execrably witless comedies like Meet the Fockers and The Heartbreak Kid, Ben Stiller was a promising actor of relative subtlety, and he expertly mans the rudder as Mel with his skittish self-containment. An actress who never seems to fulfill her potential, Téa Leoni brings a mix of klutziness and sexy smarts to the incompetent Tina. As Nancy, Patricia Arquette has a soft, fuzzy quality that makes a nice contrast to Leoni's angularity.
Russell was smart to cast four veterans as Mel's two sets of parents. ... Read More
Rating: - Jerry Garcia, blah blah blah...
One of my all-time favorite movies--the only thing I haven't seen mentioned is Glenn Fitzgerald's scene stealing performance as the jealous, younger brother Lonnie, and all of his quotable lines. "The special son is here..." We even named our dog after this memorable character. :)
Definitely one of Ben Stiller's best and a perfect cast. Like another reviewer said, I can watch it a hundred times and still see something I hadn't seen before.
Rating:  - Outstanding cast, lousy script
I had never heard of this movie, but greatly admired the line-up.
Unfortunately, the script is a series of left turns and sidetracks,
and the thin storyline that is marginally focused is ludicrous to the
point of being annoying. Amazingly, very few funny things happen in this movie, which is a shame. Ends abruptly and cluelessly as well.
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