The Sweetest Thing

Isn’t the insufferable Cameron Diaz—she of the blond hair, pert nose, yards of teeth and tendency to shake her groove thang—many hours past her 15 minutes of fame? This movie, directed by Roger Kumble (Cruel Intentions) and scribbled in crayon by Nancy Pimental (formerly of South Park), proves it. Diaz plays Christina, a young San Francisco professional who in terms of romance is never looking beyond Mr. Right Now. She finds the man of her dreams (Thomas Jane), but he’s about to be unhappily married. Something meant to be hilarity commences, with hints of female empowerment typified by a we-can-be-as-tasteless-as-the-boys attitude. But Christina’s antics with her two friends (Christina Applegate, Selma Blair) never progress beyond Sex and the City-style bawdiness and Ally McBeal-style fantasy sequences, as they might be directed by the Farrelly Brothers. Blair is a fine comic actress but is wasted here, as are Parker Posey, an oddly charismatic Jason Bateman and The Mary Tyler Moore Show’s Georgia Engel.