Along Came Polly (12A: Ben Stiller, Jennifer Aniston, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Debra Messing, Alec Baldwin

ALONG come comedy duo Ben Stiller and writer-director John Hamburg for another outing, after their hits Zoolander and Meet the Parents.

Stiller is Reuben Feffer, a risk analyst who finds his wife Lisa (Debra Messing) getting intimate with a scuba-diving instructor (Hank Azaria) on the first day of their honeymoon.

It's a perfect role for the hangdog, always unlucky Stiller, but humiliation turns into fortune when he meets old classmate Polly Prince (Aniston) at an art gallery.

The basic premise of this amusing film is a romantic mismatch: cautious Stiller meets wacky, off-the-cuff Aniston.

The ultimate outcome is predictable, as it often is in rom coms, but the journey there is pleasing, if forgettable, and rarely drags thanks to the film's 90-minute length.

Aniston again shows great charm for comedy roles with a great sense of timing. And Philip Seymour Hoffman is well placed as Sandy Lyle, the slob, know-all pal of Stiller.

Along Came Polly is not as clever of funny as Meet the Parents - some of the set pieces such as an overflowing toilet gag were more miss than hit.

But Stiller carries it well through a hilarious 'kick-me' persona that he did so well in There's Something About Mary.

In case you thought he was starting to paint himself into a cinematic corner with such roles, he's back in a few weeks in Starsky and Hutch. Should be interesting.

Mono rating: six out of ten