This movie could easily make you dislke men!...

Rating: 8/10 (26 December 2018)

... because just about every man in the film is a liar. In 1985 Ted (Ben Stiller) is a geeky teenager who has a crush on beautiful Mary (Cameron Diaz). He asks her out to the prom, and she accepts. But before they can even go on their date disaster strikes in every possible, unintentional, and humiliating way for Ted, and the date never happens.
Thirteen years later, Ted still can't get Mary off of his mind and decides to hire a detective to look for her. What follows is a hilarious and rather gross tale of deceit between Mary's suitors and between the suitors and Mary, all carrying things to the point of the ridiculous to win the love of Mary. And then there is the mysterious "Brett", Mary's old boyfriend, who doesn't make an appearance until the end. All the time Mary is delightfully clueless to be so smart - she's an orthopedic surgeon.
There are supporting almost cameo appearances by Markie Post of "Night Court" fame as Mary's mother, Keith David as Mary's rather angry stepfather - at Ted not Mary , W. Earl Brown as Mary's mentally handicapped brother, and Lin Shaye as Mary's neighbor with the shoe leather tan who is playing the same kind of "gross out" role that she played in the Farrelly Brothers' film "Kingpin".
Along the way is a stalker with a shoe fetish, the shooting of a minstrel where the bullet was meant for Ted, a mass murderer, a yorkshire terrier with the engine and fortitude of twelve rottweilers, and a great music video of the song I will forever associate with this film - "Build Me Up Buttercup".
Highly recommended for people who know when not to take things so seriously. It still cheers me up over twenty years later.