I would like to take a few moments to toast the major comedic talents of Seattle’s own diminutive blonde bombshell Miss Anna Faris. Playing the incredibly spoiled (and remarkably talentless) Jessica Simpson meets Britney Spears meets Bimbo Barbie rock star Samantha James, Faris brings so much gleefully archaic fireball charisma and charm to her portrayal I couldn’t take my eyes off of her. She’s a brainless stripper masquerading as a singer with a motor-mouth refusing to quit and sporting a case of ADD so bad a person never knows what’s going to come out of her next. She’s astonishing, even making the name Darla so preposterously funny I’m almost doing a spit-take right now thinking about it.

Too bad she’s stuck in an otherwise wretched waste of a movie. Based on “Just Friends,” I’m coming to the conclusion that 1999's “Cruel Intentions” (a witty remake of “Dangerous Liaisons” with Sarah Michelle Gellar, Ryan Phillippe and Reese Witherspoon) was a bizarre fluke for director Roger Kumble. After suffering through this (and the even more heinous 2002 Cameron Diaz comedy “The Sweetest Thing”), any talent I thought he might have had has now become buried under the colossal weight of two gallingly awful misfires. This movie isn’t just bad, it’s sit-in-your-seat-with-your-eyes-popping-out-of-your-head-because-you-can’t-believe-it’s-this-phenomally-bad, bad. I didn’t like it, and if you’re looking for me to be any clearer I’m sorry but I can’t get too much more transparent than that.

The basic premise is simple enough. Chris Brander (Ryan Reynolds) is a successful L.A. music executive who doesn’t believe friendship between men and women is possible, let alone a good thing. What scared him on feminine friendship and makes him strive so hard to stay out of that nasty gray area he ironically nicknames the “Friend Zone?” After graduating from high school, an overweight and socially retarded Chris discovered the hard way that the beautiful and popular Jamie Palamino (Amy Smart) only wanted to be his best friend, never once looking at him as someone she could ever possibly get romantic with. Humiliated in front of the entire school, Brander made it his mission there to become everything women want in a man, even if doing so costs him his soul in the process.

A decade later, Chris suddenly finds himself back smack dab in the middle of New Jersey during Christmastime, forced to stay at home when the plane carrying him and Samantha has an impromptu breakdown. Soon, he’s mingling with old friends Clark (Fred Ewanvick) and Darla (Amy Matysio), beating up his younger brother Michael (Christopher Marquette) and doing his best to evade Samantha. Most of all, though, this unexpected homecoming gives him an all-new opportunity to impress (and hopefully romance) a still-beautiful and benevolent Jamie. But when a fellow former misfit, Dusty (Chris Klein), complicates matters, and with Samantha doing her best to pull him into her own hyper-energetic sexual web, remaining stuck in the Friend Zone where Jamie is concerned might be the least of his romantic problems.

“Just Friends,” frankly, isn’t any good. The script by Adam “Tex” Davis is cliché and anemic, cribbing so freely from the  “There’s Something About Mary” and “American Pie” playbooks the filmmakers behind those hits should probably demand royalties. Worse, Kumble directs on autopilot, the movie having no sense of flow or any discernable visual style stetting it apart from your typical run-of-the-mill television sitcom. The basic fact here is that this picture simply isn’t funny, it isn’t interesting and it’s virtually a complete waste of time. For the majority of its 90-plus minutes, no matter how hard Reynolds, Smart and Klein try, there just aren’t any laughs, and for a flick selling itself as a comedy that’s a cardinal sin.

The wild card here, of course, is Faris. I find myself busting out in grins just thinking about her. I know I’m starting to sound like a broken record, but every time she’s onscreen I just couldn’t help but smile, Faris adding sass, zing and unpredictability to a film holding virtually none of those traits whatsoever. In fact, she’s worth an entire star all on her lonesome, making this a one star train wreck miraculously earning a two star review. Not exactly something that’s going to make “Just Friends” worth getting aquatinted with, mind you, but it is just enough to keep it out my self-described movie Hate Zone. How’s that for a minor victory?

Film Rating: êê  (out of 4)